any Pope either by word or writing either hath already or shall at any time hereafter define to be a doctrine of faith Because I will not stay on particulars if any please seriously to consider this matter hee shall perceive that which now I intend to prove such venome of infidelity to lye in that one fundamentall position of the Popes Cathedrall infallibility that by reason of holding it they neither doe nor can beleeve or hold with certaintie of faith any one point or doctrine which they professe to beleeve and hold upon that Foundation 20. For the clearing of which point being very materiall it is to be observed that unto certainty of faith two things are of necessity required The one ex parte objecti on the part of thing beleeved which must be so true and certaine in it selfe that it cannot possibly bee or have beene otherwise then it is beleeved to be to have beene or to be hereafter And therefore none can truly beleeve any untruth for nothing which is untrue is or can be the object of faith The other thing is required ex parte subjecti on the part of him who beleeveth Now faith being onely of such things as are inevident that is which neither by sense can be perceived nor by naturall reason collected or found out but which are onely by the testimonie of such as first knew them made knowne unto us and none doth or can know that which is supernaturall unlesse God himselfe reveale the same unto him it hence followeth that whatsoever is by any beleeved the same is revealed and testified to him by God himselfe who is infallible and further that it is certainly knowne unto him who beleeveth that it is God himselfe who doth reveale and testifie that thing unto him For otherwise though the doctrine proposed be in it selfe never so certaine and divine yet unto thee or me it cannot be certaine nor held by certainty of faith unlesse first we be sure and infallibly certaine that he who testifieth it unto us is himselfe infallible that is that he is God Let us for perspicuity call the former of these two materiale fidei the materiall in faith or the thing beleeved and the later formale fidei that which is formall in faith seeing as the former is the thing beleeved so the later containes the reason the ground or foundation upon which and for which it is beleeved 21. Consider now first the materials in their faith In them there is a great difference for some of them are in themselves credible as being divine truths and true objects of faith Such are all those Catholike truths common to us and them as that there is a Trinity that Christ was borne of a Virgin dyed rose againe and the like Others are in themselves untrue such as cannot be the object of faith Of this sort are all those doctrines wherin they dissent from us Transubstantiation reall and proper sacrifice worshipping of Images Purgatory Iustification by the merit or dignity of our works and the like which may rightly bee called popish doctrines The later sort of these they neither doe nor can beleeve The former they might but they doe not beleeve The reason whereof will appeare by considering that which is formall or the fundamentall ground of their faith where it is first to be observed that a man may hold many yea all the doctrines professed by the present Church except that one of the Popes Cathedrall infallibility and yet bee no Papist or member of their present Church For although the things professed or the Materialls be the selfe same yet the formalitie or diverse reason of holding them causeth a maine difference in the parties that hold them And for our present purpose it may suffice to note three divers wayes whereby their doctrines are or may be held 22. The first is of them who build all those doctrines upon the Scripture as the Foundation thereof upon that ground holding not onely many Catholike truths which they most firmly beleeve the Church inducing the Scriptures outwardly teaching and the holy Spirit inwardly sealing the same unto them but together with those truths hold some errors also of the Romane Church take for example Transubstantiation which although for the inducement of that present Church wherein they live they thinke to be taught in the Scriptures and therefore hold and professe them and thinke they beleeve them yet because they are neither in truth taught in the Scriptures nor sealed by Gods Spirit unto their hearts therefore they hold not these nor in truth can they hold them with that firmnesse and certainty of faith as they doe the former truths but they have a faintnes and feare in their assent unto these and so a readines and willing preparation of heart to disclaime these and to hold or professe the contrary if ever it may be fully cleared manifested out of the Scriptures unto them Of this sort we doubt not but many thousands of our fathers were who living in the darknesse thicke mists of their Antichristian superstition upon the Scriptures word of God which they held for the foundation of their saith builded indeed much gold precious stones but with a mixture of much hay stubble drosse thinking but very erroneously the later as well as the former to be contained in that foundation The state of all these is very like to S. Cyprians and those other Africane Bishops which were so earnest for Rebaptizatiō supposing it to be taught in the Scriptures though the foundation of it of those catholike truths that Christ was God or the like was one and the same unto them yet they held not both with like firmnes certainty of faith The doctrine of Christs deity manhood they so beleeved that they would not cōmunicate with any that denied this nay they would rather die then deny it But Rebaptization they so held as not thinking their opposites to be heretikes nor refusing p Haecre scripsimus nemini praescribentes aut praejudicantes quo minus unusquisque quod putaverit faciat habent liberam arbitrij sui facultatē Nos autem cum Collegis nostris non contendimus cum quibus divinam dominicam pacem tenemus Cyp. Epist ad Iubaian in fine vid. August lib. 5. de Baptis ca. 17. to cōmunicate with thē that denyed it so they held this with a certaine faintnes of faith or rather as indeed it was of opinion and not of faith having a preparation in heart to beleeve and professe the contrary if it might at any time be made manifest unto them This S. Austen often witnesseth of Cyprian Satis q Lib. 2. de Baptis ca. 4. ostendit se facillime correcturum he sufficiently declareth that hee would most easily have altered his opinion if any would have demonstrated the truth unto him Againe r Lib. 4 ca. 5. That holy man Cyprian being non solum doctus sed docilis not onely
10. and his Laterane Synod are ample witnesses that this Sanction was never repealed before that Synod for they f Conc. Later ses 11 complaine that by reason of the malignitie of those times or else because they could not helpe it his predecessors tolerasse visi sunt seemed to have tolerated that pragmaticall Sanction and that for all which either they did or could doe the same Sanction retroactis temporibus viguisse et adhuc vigere had in former times and did even to that very day of their eleventh Session stand in force and full vigor Now seeing that Sanction condemneth as hereticall as did the Council also of Basil that assertion of the Popes Supremacie of authoritie and infallibilitie of judgment in defining causes of faith which the present Romane Church defendeth it is now cleerly demonstrated that the same Assertion was taught professed and beleeved to be an heresie and the obstinate defenders thereof to be heretikes by the consenting judgement of Councils Popes Bishops and the Catholike Church even from the Apostles time unto that very day of their Laterane Session which was the 19. of December in the yeare 1516. after Christ 33 On that day a day never to be forgotten by the present Romane Church it being the birth-day thereof Leo the tenth with his Laterane Councill or as the learned Divines of Paris g Leo 10. in quedam caetu nescimus qualiter tamen non in Spiritu Domini congregato App. Vniv Paris account it Conspiracie they being not assembled in Gods name abolished as much as in them lay the old and Catholike doctrine which in all ages of the Church had beene beleeved and professed untill that day and instead thereof erect a new faith yea a new foundation of the faith and with it a new Church also Hee and his Synod then reprobated h Quae de authoritate Concilij supra Pontificem constituerunt sententia CoÌ„c Lateranensis plane reprobata sunt Bin. Not. in Conc. Const § Ex parte the Decree of Constance for the superioritie of a Councill above the Pope they reprobated i Reprobarunt decre tum Concilij Basiliensis Bel. lib. 2. de Conc. ca. 17. § Denique also the Councill of Basil and the same Decree renewed by them That Councill they condemne as Conciliabulum or k Conc. Lat. sess 11. Conventiculam quae nullum robur habere potuerit As a Conspiracie and Conventicle which could have no force at all They reprobated the l Ibid. Pragmaticall Sanction wherein the Decree of Constance and Basil was for ever confirmed Now that Decree being consonant to that catholike Faith which for 1500 yeares together had beene imbraced and beleeved by the whole catholike Church untill that day in reprobating it they rejected and reprobated the old and catholike Faith of the whole Church In stead hereof they decreed the Popes authoritie to be m Hujus sanctae sedis suprema authoritate Ibid. pa. 640. supreme that it is de n Ibid. necessitate salutis a thing necessary to salvation for all Christians to be subject to the Pope and that not onely as they are severally considered but even as they assembled together in a generall Councill for they define Solum o Jbid. pa. 639. Romanum Pontificem authoritatem super omnia Concilia habere The Pope alone to have authoritie above all Generall Councills This the Councill at Laterane diserte ex professo docuit taught cleerly and purposely as Bellarmine tells p Lib. 2. de Concil ca. 17. § Denique us nay they did not onely teach it but expressissimè definiunt q Lib. cod ca. 13. § Deinde they did most expresly define it And that their Definition is no other then a Decree of Faith as the same Cardinall assures us Decrees of faith saith he r Lib. â—â—d ca. 17. § Ad hunc are immutable neyther may ever be repealed after they are once set downe Tale autem est hoc de quo agimus and such is this Decree for the Popes supreme authoritie over all even Generall Councils made in their Laterane Synod And what meane they thinke you by that supreme authoritie Truly the same which Bellarmine explaineth That because his authoritie is supreme therefore his judgement s Proinde ultimum judicium summi poÌ„tificis esse lib. 4. de Rom. pontif ca. 1. § Sed nec in causes of Faith is the last and highest and because it is the last and highest therefore it is t Restat igitur ut Papa sit Index ultimus et proinde noÌ„ possit errare Lib. 4. de Pont. Rom. ca. 3. § Contra. Et DicuÌ„t Concilij sententiam esse ultimuÌ„ judicium Hinc autem apertissimè sequitur non errare Lib. 2. de Conc. ca. 3. § Accedat infallible So by their Decree together with supremacie of authority they have given infallibilitie of judgement to the Pope and defined that to be a catholike truth and doctrine of Faith which the whole Church in all ages untill then taught professed and defined to be an heresie and all who maintaine it to be Heretikes and for such condemned both it and them 34 Now because this is not onely a doctrine of their faith but the very foundation on which all their other doctrines of faith doe relie by decreeing this they have quite altered not onely the faith but the whole frame and fabricke of the church erecting a new Romane church consisting of them and them onely who maintaine the Popes Infallibilitie and supremacie decreed on that memorable day in their Laterane Synod a church truly new and but of yesterday not so old as Luther a church in faith and communion severed from all former generall Councils Popes and Bishops that is from the whole catholike Church of Christ which was from the Apostles times untill that day And if their Popes continue as it is to be presumed they doe to make that profession which by the Councils of Constance and Basil they are bound to doe to hold among other this fift Councill ad unum iôta this certainly is but a verball no cordiall profession there neither is nor can be any truth therein it being impossible to beleeve both the Popes Cathedrall judgement in causes of faith to be hereticall as the fift Councill defined and the Popes Cathedrall sentence in such causes to be infallible as their Laterane Councill decreed So by that profession is demonstrated that their doctrine of faith is both contradictory to it selfe such as none can possibly beleeve and withall new such as is repugnant to that faith which the whole Catholike Church of Christ embraced untill that very day of their Laterane Session 35 Yea and even then was not this holy truth abolished Foure moneths did not passe after that Laterane Decree was made but it was condemned by the whole Vniversitie of v In Appel à Leon. 10. quae facta est 21 die Mart. an 1517. Decret
assent to their Popes or to their Cathedrall definitions and doctrines maintained by the present Romane Church but co nomine even for that very cause they are convicted condemned and accursed heretikes For the manifesting of which conclusion I will begin with that their fundamentall position of the Popes Cathedrall infallibility in defining causes of faith whereof before I have so often made mention And to prove the present Romane Church to bee hereticall herein two things are to be declared the one that this is indeed the position or doctrine of their Church the other that this doctrine is hereticall and for such condemned by the Catholike Church 7. For the former that the assertion of Popes infallibility in defining causes of faith is the doctrine of the present Romane Church I thinke none conversant in their writings will make doubt Give mee leave to propose some testimonies of their owne The Pope saith Bellarmine g Lib. 4. de pont ca. 3. §. Sic. when hee teacheth the whole Church those things which belong to faith nullo casu errare potest hee can by no possible meanes then erre And this as he saith is certissimum a most certaine truth and in the end hee addeth this is a signe Ecclesiam totam sentire that the whole Church doth beleeve the Pope to be in such causes infallible So he testifying this to be the judgement and doctrine of their whole Church The Iesuite Coster for himselfe and their whole Church saith We h Ench. tit de summo pont §. Fatemur doe constantly deny the Popes vel haeresim docere posse vel errorem proponere to be able either to teach an heresie or to propose an errour to be beleeved When the Pope saith Bozius i Th. Boz lib 18. de Sig. Eccl. ca. 6. §. Sequitur teacheth the Church or sets forth a decree of faith Divinitùs illi praeclusa est omnis via God then stoppeth every way unto him which might bring him into errour Againe k Idem lib. 16. ca. 8. §. Rursus in making such decrees nunquam valuit aut valebit facere contra fidem he never was he never shall be able to doe ought against the faith We beleeve saith Gretzer l Def. ca. 3. lib. 4. de Rom. Pont. §. Terius the judgement of him who succeeds Peter in the Chaire non secus ac olim Petri infallibile to be no otherwise infallible then the judgement of Peter was And the m Idem def ca. 28. lib. 1. de pontif §. Quocirca gates of hell shall never be able to drive Peters successours ut errorem quempiam ex cathedra definiant that they shall define any errour out of the Chaire This is saith Stapleton n Relect. Cont. 3. qu. 4. §. Circa a certaine and received truth among Catholikes That the Pope when he decreeth ought out of his pontificall office hath never yet taught any hereticall doctrine nec tradere potest nor can he deliver any error yea if it bee a judgement o Rel. Conc. 6. q. 3. Art 5. §. Respondeo of faith it is not onely false but hereticall to say that the Pope can erre therein They saith Canus p Loc. Theol. lib. 6. ca. 7. §. Quid. who reject the Popes judgement in a cause of faith are heretickes To this accordeth Bellarmine q Lib. 3. de verb. Dei ca. 8. §. Excutimus It is lawfull to hold either part in a doubtfull matter without note of heresie before the Popes definition be given but after the Popes sentence he who then dissenteth from him is an hereticke To these may be added as Bellarmine testifieth r Lib. 4. de Pont. ca. 2. § Quarto St. Thomas Thomas Waldensis Cardinall Turrecremata Cardinall Cajetane Cardinall Hosius Driedo Eccius Iohannes a Lovanio and Peter Soto all these teach it to be impossible that the Pope should define any hereticall doctrine And after them all the saying of Gregory de Valentia is most remarkable to this purpose It now appeareth saith he ſ In 2. 2. disp 1. q. 1. punct 1 part 30. that Saint Thomas did truly and orthodoxally teach that the proposall or explication of our Creed that is of those things which are to be beleeved doth belong unto the Pope which truth containes so clearely the summe and chiefe point of Catholike religion ut nemo Catholicus esse possit qui illam non amplectatur that none can be a Catholike unlesse hee hold and embrace this So he professing that none are to be held with them for Catholikes but such as maintaine the Popes infallibilitie in proposing or defining causes of faith 8. They have yet another more plausible manner of teaching the Popes Infallibilitie in such causes and that is by commending the judgement of the Church and of generall Councels to be infallible All Catholikes saith Bellarmine t Lib 2. de Conc. ca. 2 §. Ac ut doe constantly teach that generall Councels confirmed by the Pope cannot possibly erre in delivering doctrines of faith or good life And this he saith is so certaine that fide catholica tenendum est it is to be embraced by the Catholike faith and so all Catholikes are bound to beleeve it Likewise concerning the Church he thus writeth u Lib. de Eccles milit ca. 14. §. Nostra Nostra sententia est it is our sentence that the Church cannot absolutely erre in proposing things which are to bee beleeved The same is taught by the rest of their present Church Now when they have said all and set it out with great pompe and ostentation of words for the infallibility of the Church and Councell it is all but a meere collusion a very maske under which they cover and convaie the Popes Infallibilitie into the hearts of the simple Try them seriously who list sound the depth of their meaning and it will appeare that when they say The Church is infallible Generall Councels are infallible The Pope is infallible they never meane to make three distinct infallible Iudges in matters of faith but one onely infallible and that one is the Pope 9. This to be their meaning sometimes they will not let to professe When we teach saith Gretzer x Def. ca. 10. lib. 3. de verb. Dei §. Iam. pa. 1450. that the Church is the infallible Iudge in causes of faith per Ecclesiā intelligimus Pontificem Romanum we by the Church doe meane the Pope for the time being or him with a Councell Againe y Ibid. §. An. pd 1451. They object unto us that by the Church we understand the Pope Non abnuo I confesse wee meane so in deed This is plaine dealing by the Church they meane the Pope So Gregorie de Valentia z In 2. 2. disp 1. q. 1. By the name of the Church we understand the head of Church that is the Pope So Bozius a Lib. 2. de sig eccl ca. 21. §. His. lib.
learned but willing to learne and who sets this among the prayses of a Bishop that hee ought not onely to teach with knowledge but learne with patience hee I doubt not would readily have demonstrated not onely how learned but how willing to learne himselfe had beene had this question in his life time beene debated by such learned and holy men as afterwards it was I often admire that one observation among many which the same ſ Lib. 1. ca. 18. Augustine makes touching this error in Cyprian of whom being so very learned he saith Propterea non vidit aliquid ut per eum aliud eminentius videretur He therefore saw not this one truth touching Rebaptization that others might see in him a more eminent and excellent truth And what truth is that In him we may see the truth of Humilitie the truth of modestie the truth of Charitie and ardent love to the peace and unitie of the Church but the most excellent truth that I can see or as I thinke can be seene in erring Cyprian is this that one may be a true Catholike a Catholike Bishop a pillar of Gods Church yea even a Saint and glorious Martyr and yet hold an error in faith as did that holy Catholike Bishop and blessed Martyr Saint Cyprian To him then and the other Africane Bishops who in like sort erred as he did may fitly be compared the state of those servants of God who in the blindnesse and invincible ignorance of those times of Antichrist together with many golden truths which they most firmely beleeved upon that solid foundation of the Scriptures held either Transubstantiation or the like errors thinking them as Cyprian did of Rebaptization to be taught in that foundation also They erred in some doctrines of faith as Cyprian did yet notwithstanding those errors they may be Catholikes and blessed as Cyprian was because they both firmely beleeved many Catholike truths and their error was without pertinacie as Cyprians was For none who truly beleeves the Scripture and holds it for the foundation of his faith can with pertinacie hold any doctrine repugnant to the Scripture seeing in his very beleeveing of the Scripture and holding it as the foundation he doth in truth though implicitiè and in radice as I may say beleeve the flat contrarie to that error which explicitè he professeth And because he doth implicitè beleeve the contrarie thereof he hath even all the time while he so erreth a readinesse and preparation of hart to professe the contrarie whensoever out of the Scripture it shall bee deduced and manifested unto him 23. A second way of holding those doctrines is of them who together with the truths hold the errours also of their Church Transubstantiation Purgatorie or the like thinking them to bee taught in Scriptures as did the former but adding obstinacie or pertinacie to their holding of them which the former did not And their pertinacie is apparant hereby if either they will not yeeld to the truth being manifested out of the Scriptures unto them or if before such manifestation they be so addicted and wedded to their owne wills and conceits that they resolve either not to heare or if they doe heare not to yeeld to the evidence of reason when they are convinced by it For it is certaine that one may bee truly pertinacious not onely after conviction and manifestation of the truth but even before it also if he have a resolution not to yeeld to the authority and weight of convincing reasons Of this sort were all those who ever since their second Nicen Synod about which time the Romane Church made their first publike defection from the true and ancient faith tooke part with that faction in the Church which maintained the adoration of Images and after that Deposing of Princes then Transubstantiation and other like heresies as they crept by degrees into the Church in severall ages From that time untill Leo the tenth the Church was like a confused lumpe wherein both gold and drosse were mingled together or like a great Citie infected with the plague All as well the sicke as sound lived together within the walls and bounds of that Citie but all were not infected and of those that were not all alike infected with those hereticall diseases which then raigned more and more prevaled in the Church Some openly and constantly withstood the corruptions and heresies of their time and being worthy Martyrs sealed with their blood that truth which they professed Others dissented from the same errors but durst not with courage and sortitude oppose themselves such as would say to their friends in private Thus ſ Paralip ad Abb. Vsperg pa. 448. I would say in the schooles and openly sed maneat inter nos diversum sentio but keepe my counsell I thinke the contrarie Many were tainted with those Epidemicall diseases by the very contagion of those with whom they did converse but that strong Antidote in the foundation which preserved Cyprian and the Africane Bishops kept from their hearts and at last overcame all the poyson wherewith they were infected Onely that violent and strong faction which pertinaciously adhered to the hereticall doctrines which then sprung up the head of which faction was the Pope and who preferred their owne opinions before the truth out of the Scriptures manifested unto them and by some Councels also decreed as namely by that at Constantinople in the time of Constantinus Iconomachus and that at Frankford these I say who wilfully and maliciously resisted yea persecuted the truth and such as stood in defence of it are those who are ranked in this second order who though they are not in proprietie of speech to bee called Papists yet because the errors which they held are the same which the Popish Church now maintaineth they are truly and properly to be tearmed Popish Heretickes 24. The third way of holding their doctrines beganne with their Lateran decree under Leo the tenth at which time they held the same doctrines which they did before but they held thē now upon another Foundation For thē they cast away the old and sure Foundation and laid a new one of their owne in the roome thereof The Popes word in stead of Gods and Antichrists in stead of Christs For although the Pope long before that time had made no small progresse in Antichristianisme first in usurping an universall authority over all Bishops next in upholding their impious doctrines of Adoration of Images and the like and after that in exalting himselfe above all Kings and Emperors giving and taking away their Crownes at his pleasure yet the height of the Antichristian mysterie consisted in none of these nor did he ever attaine unto it till by vertue of that Laterane decree he had justled out Christ and his word and laid himselfe and his owne word in the stead thereof for the Rocke Foundation of the Catholike faith In the first the Pope was but Antichrist nascent In the
of Rome and members thereof professe to hold the faith of the fift generall Councell and so professe implicitè the Popes Cathedrall sentence in a cause of faith to be fallible and hereticall but they lye in making this profession for they beleeve not the Popes sentence in such causes to be fallible but with the Laterane and Trent Councels they hold it to be infallible It is the practice of all heretikes to make such faire though lying professions For should they say in plaine termes that which is truth indeed wee beleeve not the scriptures nor the Councells of Nice Ephesus or Chalcedon every man would spit at them and detest them cane pejus angue nor could they ever deceive any or gaine one proselyte But when they commend their faith that is their heresie to be the same doctrine with the scriptures which the Councells of Nice Ephesus and Chalcedon taught by these faire pretences and this lying profession they insinuate themselves into the hearts of the simple deceiving hereby both themselves and others 16. The other consequent is this That the profession of all heretikes is contradictory to it selfe For they professe to hold the scriptures and so to condemne every heresie and yet withal they professe one private doctrine repugnant to scripture and which is an heresie The like may be said of the Councells The Nestorians by professing to hold the faith decreed at Nice professe Christ to bee but one person and yet withall by holding Nestorianisme they professe Christ to be two persons The Eutycheans by professing to hold the Councell of Ephesus professe two natures to remaine in Christ after the union which in that Councell is certainly decreed and yet by professing the heresie of Eutyches they professe the quite contradictory that one nature onely remaines after the union The Church of Rome and members thereof by professing the faith of the fift Councell professe the Popes Cathedrall sentence in a cause of faith to be fallible and de facto to have beene hereticall and yet they professe the direct contradictory as the Councell of Laterane hath defined that the Popes sentence in such causes is infallible and neither hath beene nor can be hereticall So repugnant to it selfe and incoherent is the profession of all heretikes that it sighteth both with the truth and with it owne selfe also The very same is to be seene in Vigilius and his Constitution For in professing to defend the three Chapters and in decreeing that all shall defend them he professeth all the blasphemies of Nestorius and decreeth that all shall maintaine them and professing to hold the faith decreed at Chalcedon and decreeing that all shall hold it hee professeth that Nestorianisme is heresie and decreeth that all shall condemne it for heresie and so decreeing both these he decreeth that all men in the world shall beleeve two contradictories and beleeve them as Catholike Truths Such a worthy Apostolicall decree is this of Vigilius for defending whereof Baronius doth more then toyle himselfe 17. You will againe demand Seeing Vigilius doth so earnestly and plainely professe both these why shall not his expresse profession to hold the Councell of Chalcedon make him or shew him to bee a Catholike rather then his other expresse profession to defend the Three Chapters make or shew him to bee an hereticke Why rather shall his hereticall then his orthodoxall profession give denomination unto him I also demand of you Seeing every hereticke in expresse words professeth to beleeve the whole Scripture which is in effect a condemning of every heresie why shall not this orthodoxall profession make or shew him to be a Catholike rather then his expresse profession of some one doctrine contrarie to Scripture say for example sake of Arianisme make or shew him to bee an Arian hereticke The reason of both is one and the same Did an Arian so professe to hold the Scriptures that hee were resolved to forsake his Arianisme and confesse Christ to bee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 upon manifestation that the Scriptures taught this certainely his professiō of Arianisme with such a professiō to hold the Scriptures could not make him an hereticke no more then Cyprians profession of Rebaptization or Irenees of the millenarie heresie did make them heretikes Erre hee should as they did but being not pertinacious in error hereticke hee could not be as they were not But it falls out otherwise with all heretickes They professe to hold the Scripture yet so that they resolve not to forsake that private doctrine which they have chosen to maintaine That they will hold and they will have that to be the doctrine of the Scripture notwithstanding all manifestation to the contrarie even of the Scriptures themselves They resolve of this that whosoever Bishops Councells or Church teach the contrarie to that or say judge that the Scripture so teacheth they all erre or mistake the meaning of the Scriptures Thus did not Cyprian nor Irenee And this wilfull and pertinacious resolution it is which evidently sheweth that in truth they beleeve not the Scriptures but beleeve their own fancies though they say a thousand times that they beleeve and embrace whatsoever the Scriptures teach for did they beleeve any doctrine say Arianisme eo nomine because the Scripture teacheth it they would presently beleeve the contrarie thereunto when it were manifested unto them as is was to the Arians by the Nicen Coūcell that the Scripture taught the contrarie to their error Seeing this they will not doe It is certaine that they hold their private opiniō eo nomine because they will hold it and they hold it to bee the doctrine of scripture not because it is so but because they will have it to bee so say what any will or can to the contrarie So their owne will and not Scripture is the reason why they beleeve it nay why they hold it with such a stiffe opinion for beleife it is not it cannot be This pertinacie to have beene in the Nestorians Eutycheans and the rest is evident Had they beleeved as they professed the faith decreed at Nice and Ephesus then upon manifestation of their errors out of those Councels they would have renounced their heresies but seeing the Nestorians persisted to hold two persons in Christ notwithstanding that the whole Councell of Ephesus manifested unto them that the Nicene Councel held but one person and seeing the Eutycheans persisted to hold but one nature after the union notwithstanding that the whole Councell at Chalcedon manifested unto them that the holy Ephesine Synod held two natures to abide in him after the union they did hereby make it evident unto all that they so professed to hold those Councels as that they resolved not to forsake their Nestorian and Eutichean heresies for any manifestation of the truth or conviction of their error out of those Councels and their profession of them was in effect as if they had said we hold those Councels and will have them to
teach what wee affirme whatsoever any manor Councell saith or can say to the contrarie The like must be said of Pope Vigilius in this cause Had he so professed to hold the Councell of Chalcedon as that upon manifestion that the Three Chapters were condemned by it he would have forsaken the defence of them then certainely his defending of these 3. Chapters had not bin pertinacious nor should have made him an hereticke but his profession to hold the faith decreed at Chalcedon notwithstanding his error about the 3. Chapters should have made him a catholike But seeing Vig. persisted to defend the 3. Chapt. though it was made evidēt unto him by the Synodall judgement of the fift Councell that the definition of saith decreed at Chalcedon condemned them all he by this persisting in heresie did demonstrate to all that he professed to hold the Councell at Chalcedon no otherwise then with a pertinacious resolution not to forsake the defence of those Three hereticall Chapters although the whole Church of God should manifest unto him that the Councell of Chalcedon condemned the same and for this cause his defending of those three Chapters with this pertinacie and wilfull resolution declareth him to bee indeed an hereticke notwithstanding his profession to hold the Councell of Chalcedon and faith thereof whereby all those Chapters are condemned which profession being joyned with the former pertinacie could not now either make or declare him to be a Catholike 18. The very same must bee said of the present Romane Church and members thereof Did they in such sort professe to hold the fift Councel and faith thereof as that upon manifestation that this Councell beleeved taught and decreed that the Popes Cathedrall sentence in a cause of faith is fallible and de facto hath beene hereticall they would condemne that their fundamentall heresie of the Popes Cathedrall infallibilitie decreed in their Laterane and Trent assemblies then should they much rather for their profession of the fift Councell and faith thereof bee orthodoxall then for professing together with this the Popes Cathedrall infallibilitie bee hereticall But seeing they know by the very Acts and judiciall sentence of that fift Councell by which the Cathedrall Constitution of Vigilius is condemned and accursed for hereticall in this cause of faith touching the Three Chapters that the fift Councell beleeved this and decreed under the censure of an Anathema that all others should beleeve it and that all who beleeve the contrary are heretikes seeing I say notwithstanding this manifestation of the faith of that Councell they persist to defend the Popes Cathedrall infallibility in those causes yea defend it as the very foundation of their faith this makes it evident to all that they do no otherwise professe to hold this fift Councell or the other whether precedent or following for they all are consonant to this but with this pertinacious resolution not to forsake that their fundamentall heresie and therefore their expresse profession of this fift and other generall Councels yea of the Scriptures themselves cannot be so effectuall to make them Catholikes as the profession of the Popes infallibility which is joyned with this pertinacy is to make and demonstrate them to be heretikes 19. There is yet a further point to be observed touching the pertinacy of Vigilius For one may be and often is pertinacious in his errour not onely after but even before conviction or manifestation of the truth made unto him and this happeneth whensoever hee is not paratus corrigi prepared or ready to be informed of the truth and corrected thereby or when he doth nor or will not tanta solicitudine quaerere veritatem with care and diligence seeke to know the truth as after S. Austen m Epist 162. and out of him Occham n Lib. 4. part 1. ca. 2. Gerson o Cons 12. de pertinacia part 1. pa. 430. Navar p Ench. ca. 11. nu 22. Alphonsus à Castro q Lib. 1. de justa punit haeret ca. 7 and many others doe truly teach See now I pray you how farre Vigilius was from this care of seeking and preparation to embrace the truth He by his Apostolicall authoritie decreed r Const Vigil apud Bar. an 553. nu 208. that none should either write or speake or teach ought contrary to his Constitution or if they did that his decree should stand for a condemnation and refutation of whatsoever they should either write or speake Here was a tricke of Papall that is of the most supreme pertinacy that can bee devised He takes order before hand that none shall ever I say not convict him but so much as manifest the truth unto him or open his mouth or write a syllable for the manifestation thereof and so being not prepared to bee corrected no nor informed neither hee was pertinacious and is justly to bee so accounted before ever either Bishop or Councell manifested the truth unto him Even as he is farre more wilfully and obstinately delighted in darknesse who dammes up all the windowes chinkes and passages whereby any light might enter into the house wherein hee is than hee who lyeth asleepe and is willing to be awaked when the light shineth about him So was it with Pope Vigilius at this time his tying of al mens tongues and hands that they should not manifest by word or writing the truth unto him his damming up of the light that never any glimpse of the truth might shine unto him argues a mind most damnably pertinacious in errour and so far from being prepared and ready to embrace the truth that it is obdurate against the same and will not permit it so much as to come neere unto him 20. The very like pertinacy is at this day in the Romane Church and all the members thereof for having once set downe this transcendent principle the foundation of all which they beleeve that the Popes judgement in causes of faith is infallible they doe by this exclude and utterly shut out all manifestation of the truth that can possibly bee made unto them Oppose whatsoever you will against their errour Scriptures Fathers Councels reason and sense it selfe it is all refuted before it be proposed seeing the Pope who is infallible saith the contrary to that which you would prove you in disputing from those places doe either mis-cite them or mis-interpret the Scriptures Fathers and Councels or your reason from them is sophisticall and your sense of sight of touching of tasting is deceived some one defect or other there is in your opposition but an errour in that which they hold there is nay there can be none because the Pope teacheth that and the Pope in his teaching is infallible Here is a charme which causeth one to heare with a deafe eare whatsoever is opposed the very head of Medusa if you come against it it stunnes you at the first and turnes both your reason your sense and your selfe also into a very stone By
yeare after it was published was confirmed by Pope Iohn who thus writeth f Epist 1. Ioh. 2. ad Justin to 2. Conc. pa. 404. et Bar. an 534. nu 15. et seq to the Emperour You for the love of the faith and to remove heresie have published an Edict which because it agreeth with the Apostolike doctrine wee confirme by our authority and againe You have writ and published those things which both the Apostolike doctrine and the venerable authority of the holy Fathers hath decreed nos in omnibus confirmamus and we confirme it in all points This your faith is the true and certaine religion this all the Fathers Bishops of Rome and the Apostolike See hath hitherto inviolably kept this confession whosoever doth contradict hee is an alien from the holy Communion and from the Catholike Church Thus Pope Iohn What can any man in the world now thinke else of Baronius but condemne him for an accursed heretike Hee denyes the Councell of Chalcedon to embrace that profession unum de Trinitate which as the Emperour and Pope witnesse it earnestly embraceth he not onely suspecteth in this place but in plaine termes else-where g Planè comperitur eosdem ipsos Scythiae Monachos Eutycheanos fuisse haereticos Bar. an 519. nu 99. he calleth the Scythian Monks Eutycheans heretikes and oppugners of the Councell of Chalcedon and that for this cause for that both themselves professed and required others to professe Christ to bee unum de sancta Trinitate nor content herewith hee addeth these words the heresie whereof with no niter can bee washt away hee faineth saith Baronius h An. eod nu 102. that these words unus de Trinitate est crucifixus are to bee added for the strengthning and explaning of the Councell of Chalcedon which sentence unus de Trinitate est crucifixus the Legates of the Apostolike Sea prorsus reijciendam esse putarunt thought to bee such as ought utterly to be rejected as being never used by the Fathers in their Synodall sentences latere enim sciebant sub melle venenum for they knew that poison did lye under this hony Now seeing by Iustinians Edict and the Popes confirmation thereof all who either refuse or who will not professe Christ to be unum de sancta Trinitate are accursed and excluded from the Catholike Church and communion Baronius cannot possibly escape that just censure who condemneth that profession as hereticall and as repugnant to the faith of Chalcedon Thus while the Cardinall labours to prove by this the Acts of the fift Councell to bee corrupt hee demonstrates himselfe to bee both untrue hereticall rejected out of the Church and a slanderer of the holy Councell of Chalcedon as favouring the heresie of Nestorius 4. Thirdly whereas hee saith that the Scythian Monkes would inferre verba ista in Synodum Chalcedonensem bring or thrust in those words into the Councell of Chalcedon it is a slander without all colour or ground of truth they saw divers Nestorians obstinate in denying this truth that Christ was unus de sancta Trinitate who pretended for them that these words were not expressed in the Councell of Chalcedon the Monkes and Catholikes most justly replyed that though the expresse words were not there yet the sense of them was decreed in that Councell that this confession was but an expression or explication of that which was truly implicitely and more obscurely decreed at Chalcedon To falsifie the Acts of that Councell or adde one syllable unto it otherwise than by way of explanation or declaration that the Monks and Catholikes whom Baronius calleth Eutycheans never sought to doe as at large appeares by that most learned and orthodoxall booke written by Iohannes Maxentius about this very cause against which booke and the Author thereof the more earnestly Baronius doth oppose himselfe and call them hereticall hee doth not therby one whit disgrace them his tongue and pen is no slander at least not to weighed but the more he still intangles himselfe in the heresie of the Nestorians out of which in that cause none can extricate him as in another Treatise I purpose God willing to demonstrate 5. Fourthly whereas Baronius saith that the Scythian Monkes prevailed not in the dayes of Hormisda quod absque additamento Synodus rectè consisteret because the Synod of Chalcedon was well enough without that addition hee shewes a notable sleight of his hereticall fraud That the Synod is well enough without adding those words as an expresse part of the Synodall decree or as written totidem verbis by the Councell of Chalcedon is most true but nothing to the purpose for neither the Scythian Monks nor any Catholikes did affirme them so to bee or wish them so to bee added for that had beene to say in expresse words wee will have the decree falsified or written in other words than it was by the Councell But that the Synod was well enough without this additament as an explication of it and declaration of the sense of that Councell is most untrue for both Iustinian by his Edict commanded and Pope Iohn by his Apostolike authoritie confirmed that to bee the true meaning both of that Councell and of all the holy Fathers And when a controversie is once moved and on foote whether Christ ought to bee called unus de sancta Trinitate for a man then to deny this or deny it to bee decreed in the Councell of Chalcedon or to deny that it ought to be added as a true explanation of that Councell is to deny the whole Catholike faith and the decrees of the foure first Councels and though one shall say and professe in words as did Hormisda and his Legates that they hold the whole Councell of Chalcedon yet in that they expresly deny this truth which was certainly decreed at Chalcedon their generall profession shall not excuse them but their expresse deniall of this one particular shall demonstrate them both to bee heretikes and expresly to beleeve and hold an heresie repugnant to that Councell which in a generality they professe to hold but indeed and truth doe not Even as the expresse denying of the manhood or Godhead of Christ or resurrection of the dead shall convince one to bee an heretike though hee professe himselfe in a generality to beleeve and hold all that the holy Scriptures doe teach or the Nicene fathers decree If Baronius his words that the Councell is right without that additament bee taken in the former sense they are idle vaine and spoken to no purpose which of the Cardinals deepe wisedome is not to bee imagined If they bee taken as I suppose they are in the later sense they undeniably demonstrate him to bee a Cardinall Nestorian 6. But leaving all the rest of the Cardinals frauds in this passage let us come to that last clause which concernes the corrupting of the Councell of Chalcedon This saith he which in Hormisdaes dayes they could not now in this
all who are members of the present Romane Church and so continue till their death nay they not onely accurse all such but further also even all who doe not accurse such And because the decree of this fift Councill is approved by them to the least iôta it in the last place followeth that the condemning and accursing for hereticall that doctrine of the Popes infallibilitie in causes of faith and accursing for heretikes all who either by word or writing have or doe at any time hereafter defend the same and so presist till they dye nay not onely the accursing of all such but of all who doe not accurse them is warranted by Scriptures by Fathers by all generall Councils by all Popes and Bishops that have beene for more then 14. hundred yeares after Christ 30. This Vniforme consent continued in the Church untill the time of Leo the 10 and his Laterane Councill Till then neither was the Popes authoritie held for supreme nor his judiciall sentence in causes of faith held for infallible nay to hold these was judged and defined to be hereticall and the maintainers of them to be heretikes For besides that they all till that time approved this fift Councill wherein these truths were decreed the same was expresly decreed by two generall Councils the one at Constance the other at Basil not long before m Conc. Basil sinitum est an 1442. id est an 74. ante concil Later that Laterane Synod In both which it was defined that not the Popes sentence but the Iudgement of a generall Councill n Concil Basil in Decreto quinq conclus pa. 96. a. is supremum in terris the highest judgement in earth for rooting out of errors and preserving the true faith unto which judgement every one even the Pope o Cui quilibet etiamsi papalis status existat obedire tenetur Conc. Constant sess 4. et Bas sess 2. himselfe is subject and ought to obey it or if he will not is punishable p Debitè puniatur Conc. Const ses 5. Basil ses 3. by the same Consider beside many other that one testimony of the Councill of Basil and you shall see they beleeved and professed this as a Catholike truth which in all ages of the Church had beene and still ought to be embraced They having recited that Decree of the Councill at Constance for the supreme authority of a Councill to which the Pope is subject say q Sess 33. thus Licet has esse veritates fidei catholicae satis constet although it is sufficiently evident by many declarations made both at Constance here at Basil that these are truths of the Catholike faith yet for the better confirming of all Catholikes herein This holy Synod doth define as followeth The verity of the power of a generall Councill above the Pope declared in the generall Councill at Constance and in this at Basil est veritas fidei Catholicae is a veritie of the Catholike faith and after a second conclusion like to this they adjoyne a third which concernes them both He who pertinaciously gainsayeth these two verities est censendus haereticus is to be accounted an heretike Thus the Councill at Basil cleerly witnessing that till this time of the Councill the defending of the Popes authority to be supreme or his judgement to be infallible was esteemed an Heresie by the Catholike Church and the maintainers of that doctrine to be heretikes which their decrees were not as some falsly pretend rejected by the Popes of those times but ratified and confirmed and that r Per Concilia generalia quae summi Pontifices Consistorialiter declaraverunt esse legitima etiam pro eo tempore quo ejusmodi declarationes ediderunt Conc. Basil pa. 144. a. Consistorialiter judicially and cathedrally by the indubitate Popes that then were for so the Councill of Basil witnesseth who hearing that Eugenius would dissolve the Councill say s Epist Conc. Basil pa. 100. b. thus It is not likely that Eugenius will any way thinke to dissolve this sacred Council especially seeing that it is against the decrees of the Councill at Constance per praedecessorem suum et seipsum approbata which both his predecessor Pope Martine the fift and himselfe also hath approved Besides this that Eugenius confirmed the Councill at Basil there are other evident proofes His owne Bull or embossed letters wherein he saith t Literae bullatae Eugenij lectae sunt in Conc. Bas Ses 16. of this Councill purè simpliciter ac cum effectu et omni devotione prosequimur we embrace sincerely absolutely and with all affection and devotion the generall Councill at Basil The Councill often mention his adhesion v Jn sua adhaesione sess 16. his maximā adhaesionem x Decreto quinque Concl. pa. 96. b. to the Council by which Adhesion as they teach y Sess 29. pa. 96. b. Decreta corroborata sunt the Decrees of the Council at Basil made for the superiority of a Council above the Pope were cōfirmed Further yet the Orators which Pope Eug. sent to the council did not only promise but z Jurabant ejus decreta defendere c. Sess 16. corporally sweare before the whole Councill that they would defend the decrees therof particularly that which was made at Constance was now renewed at Basil Such an Harmonie there was in beleeving and professing this doctrine that the Popes judgement in causes of faith is neither supreme nor infallible that generall Councils at this time decreed it the indubitate Popes confirmed it the Popes Orators solemnly sware unto it the Vniversall a Haec veritas toties et tam solenniter per universam ecclesiam declarata est Epist Conc. Bas pa. 144. a. and Catholike Church untill then embraced it and that with such constancy and uniforme consent that as the Council of b Jn decreto quinque conclus pa. 96. Basil saith and their saying is worthy to be remembred nunquam aliquis peritorum dubitavit never any learned and skilfull man doubted therof It may be some illiterate Gnatho hath soothed the Pope in his Hildebrandicall pride vaunting c Hildebrandum sic gloriari solitum testatur Avent lib. 5. Annal. pa. 455. Se quasi deus sit errare non posse I sit in the temple of God as God I cannot erre but for any that was truly judicious or learned never any such man in all the ages of the Church untill then as the Councill witnesseth so much as doubted thereof but constantly beleeved the Popes authoritie not to be supreme and his judgement not to be infallible 31. After the Councill of Basil the same truth was still embraced in the Church though with far greater opposition then before it had witnesse hereof Nich. Cusanus a Bishop d Poss Biblic in Nic. Cusano a Cardinall a man scientijs pene omnibus excultus who lived 20 e Obijt ann 1464. Poss Conc. autem finitum
Later fact 19 Decemb. 1517. Paris as being contra fidem Catholicam against the catholike Faith and the authority of holy Councils And even to these dayes the French Church doth not onely distaste that x A Relation of Religion in the West parts published an 1605. pa. 129. Laterane Decree and hold a Generall Councill to be superiour to the Pope but their Councill also of y Gentil Exam. CoÌ„c Trid. Sess 13. Car. Mol. dec Conc. Trid. decret pa. 3. Trent wherein that Laterane Decree is confirmed is by them rejected And what speake I of them Behold while Leo with his Laterane Councill strives to quench this catholike truth it bursts out with farre more glorious and resplendent beauty This stone which was rejected by those builders of Babylon was laid againe in the foundations of Sion by those EZra's Nehemiah's Zorobabel's and holy Servants of the Lord who at the voyce of the Angell came out of Babylon and repaired the ruines of Ierusalem And even as certaine rivers are said to runne z Alpheum fama est huc Elidis amnem Occultas egisse vias subter mare Virg lib. 3. Aeâ—eid under or through the salt Sea and yet to receive no salt or bitter taste from it but at length to burst out send forth their owne sweet and delightfull waters Right so it fell out with this and some other doctrines of Faith This Catholike truth that the Popes judgement and Cathedrall sentence in causes of faith is not infallible borne in the first age of the Church and springing from the Scriptures and Apostles as from the holy mountaines of God for the space of 600 yeares and more passed with a most faire and spatious current like Tygris Euphrates watering on each side the Garden of the Lord or like Pactolus with golden streames inriching and beautifying the Church of God after that time it fell into the corrupted waters of succeeding ages brackish I confesse before their second Nycene Synod but after it and the next unto it extremely salt and unpleasant more bitter then the waters of Mara And although the nearer it came to the streets of Babylon it was still more mingled with the slime or mud of their Babylonish ditches yet for all that dangerous and long mixture continuing about the space of a Tot anni intersunt à Conc. Nic. 2. quod habituus est an 787. ad annum quo Lutherus se primum opposuit IndulgeÌ„tijs papalibus pontifici qui fuit an 1517 Cocl in vita Luther 730. yeares this truth all that time kept her native and primitive sweetnesse by the constant and successive professions of the whole Church throughout all those ages Now after that long passage through all those salt waves like Alpheus or Arethusa it bursts out againe not as they did in Sicily nor neare the Italian shores but as the Cardinall tells b Brevi occupavit Lutheri haeresis multa regna Bel. l. 3. de pontif ca. 23. § Similitudo Et Romanasedes amisit nostris temporibus magnam Germaniae partem Suetiam Gethians Norvegiam Daniam universam bonam Anglia Gallia Helvetia Polonia Bohemia ac Pannonia partem lib. eod ca. 21. § Ac postea us in Germanie in England in Scotland in France in Helvetia in Polonia in Bohemia in Pannonia in Sueveland in Denmarke in Norway in all the Reformed Churches and being by the power and goodnesse of God purified from all that mud and corruption wherewith it was mingled all which is now left in it owne proper that is in the Romane channels it is now preserved in the faire current of those Orthodoxall Churches wherein both it and other holy doctrines of Faith are with no lesse sinceritie professed theÌ„ they were in those ancient times before they were mingled with any bitter or brackish waters 36 You see now the whole judgement of the Fift Generall Councill how in every point it contradicteth the Apostolicall Constitution of Pope Vigilius condemning and accursing both it for hereticall and all who defend it for heretikes which their sentence you see is consonant to the Scriptures and the whole Catholike Church of all ages excepting none but such as adhere to their new Laterane decree and faith An example so ancient so authenticall and so pregnant to demonstrate the truth which wee teach and they oppugne that it may justly cause any Papist in the world to stagger and stand in doubt even of the maine ground and foundation whereon all his faith relyeth For the full clearing of which matter being of so great importance and consequence I have thought it needful to rip up every veine and sinew in this whole cause concerning these Three Chapters and the Constitution of Vigilius in defence of the same and withall examine the weight of every doubt evasion excuse which eyther Cardinall Baronius who is instar omnium or Binius or any other moveth or pretendeth herein not willingly nor with my knowledge omitting any one reason or circumstance which either they urge or which may seeme to advantage or help them to decline the inevitable force of our former Demonstration CAP. V. The first Exception of Baronius pretending that the cause of the Three Chapters was no cause of faith refuted 1 THere is not as I thinke any one cause which Card. Baronius in all the Volumes of his Annalls hath with more art or industry handled then this concerning Pope Vigilius and the Fift Generall Councill In this hee hath strained all his wits moved and removed every stone under which hee imagined any help might be found eyther wholly to excuse or any way lessen the errour of Vigilius All the Cardinalls forces may be ranked into foure severall troupes In the first do march all his Shifts and Evasions which are drawne from the Matter of the Three Chapters In the second those which are drawne from the Popes Constitution In the third those which respect a subsequent Act of Vigilius In the fourth last those which concerne the fift General Councill After all these wherin coÌ„sisteth the whole pith of the Cause the Cardinall brings forth another band of certaine subsidiary but most disorderly souldiers nay not souldiers they never tooke the Military oath nor may they by the Law of armes nor ever were by any worthy Generall admitted into any lawfull fight or so much as to set footing in the field meere theeves and robbers they are whom the Cardinall hath set in an ambush not to fight in the cause but onely like so many Shimei's that they might raile at and revile whomsoever the Cardinall takes a spleene at or with whatsoever hee shall be moved in the heat of his choler At the Emperour Iustinian at Theodora the Empresse at the cause it selfe of the Three Chapters at the Imperiall Edict at Theodorus Bishop of Cesarea at the Synodal acts yea at Pope Vigilius himselfe we wil first encounter the just forces of the Cardinall which onely are his lawfull
the priestly ministerie could not performe to wit the loosing of that band of censure or of sinne under which they dyed Thus Leo who denieth not that men after their death may be condemned but that any who in his life time is not may after his death bee pardoned Hee speakes not of such as have not beene in their life time condemned of which onely Vigilius entreateth but of such who being unpenitent or condemned by the Church die in their sin or under that just censure therefore in the state of condemnation So neither doe the words of Leo signifie any such thing as Vigilius by them intended to prove and Pope Pelagius assureth us that Leo taught the quite contrary to that which out of Leo Vigilius in vaine laboureth to prove 21. The very like construction is to bee given of the words of Gelasius in both the places cited out of him by Vigilius In the former x Gelas Epist 11. entreating of Acatius he thus saith Let no man perswade you that Acatius is freed from the crime of his prevarication for after he had falne into that wickednesse and deserved to be excluded and that jure by right from the Apostolike communion in hac eâdem persistens damnatione defunctus est hee persisting in this condemnation dyed Absolution cannot bee now granted unto him being dead which he neither desired nor deserved while he lived for it was said to the Apostles Whatsoever yee binde on earth But of him these are the words cited by Vigilius who is now under Gods iudgement that is who is dead in this sort it is not lawfull for us to decree ought else but that in quo eum supremus dies invenit wherein hee was found at the time of his death So Gelasius In which words it is evident that hee speakes not as Vigilius doth of such as in their life time were not condemned nor denieth hee that such may after their death when their heresie is discovered be condemned but of such as being in their life time justly condemned dye impenitent in that estate and of such he denyeth that after their death they can be absolved A truth so cleare that Binius sets this marginall note upon it Qui impoenitens mortuus est excommunicatus post mortem non potest absolvi He who dieth impenitent under the censure of excommunication cannot after his death bee absolved And Gelasius himselfe often repeateth the same most clearly in his Commonitorium to Faustus We reade saith he y Gelas Epist 4. that Christ raised up some from the dead but we never reade that he forgave or absolved any who were impenitent when they dyed and this power he gave to Peter Whatsoever thou shalt binde on earth on earth saith he nam in hac ligatione defunctum nusquam dixit absolvi For Christ never said that any who dyed being so bound should be loosed 22. The same is his meaning also in the other place z Epist Synodalis Gelas ij Synod Rom. 2. p. 268. b. alleaged by Vigilius In it he intreateth of Vitalis and Misenus who being the Popes Legates had communicated with Acatius and other hereticall sectaries and were for that cause both of them excommunicated by Pope Felix the next predecessor of Gelasius Misenus repenting was received into the communion of the Church Vitalis remaining impenitent died under that just censure when some of Vitalis friends desired the like absolution for Vitalis being dead a Nos etiam mortuis veniam praestare deposcunt ibid. Gelasius utterly refused to grant it and calling a Romane Synode it was declared in it That Misenus ought in right to be loosed but not Vitalis whom as they professed they gladly would but by reason of his owne impenitency wherein he dyed they could not helpe nor absolve but must leave him which are the words on which Vigilius relyeth to the judgement of God it being impossible for them to absolve him being dead seeing it is said Whatsoever ye shall binde upon earth such then as are not upon earth God hath reserved them not to mans but to his owne judgement Nor dare the Church challenge this unto it So Gelasius and the whole Romane Synode who doe not herein generally deny that any without exception may bee judged being dead for then they should condemne besides many other the holy Councell of Chalcedon which absolved Flavianus and bound or condemned Domnus and both after their deaths but limiting their speach to the present matter which they handled they teach that none who are dead to wit in such state as Vitalis dyed excommunicated and impenitent no such can after their death be judged to wit in such sort as the favourers of Vitalis would have had him adjudged that is absolved or loosed after his death from that censure and that the words of our Saviour doe forcibly conclude seeing whatsoever is bound upon earth is also bound in heaven and seeing such as die in that just bond of the Church are indeed reserved to the onely judgement of God the Church can pronounce no other nor milder sentence then it hath already passed of them That none at all after their death may be condemned by the Church Gelasius saith not and that is the hereticall position which Vigilius should out of Gelasius but doth not prove That none who at their death are justly bound by the Church and dye impenitent therein can after their death be loosed by the Church is a catholike truth which Gelasius teacheth and we all professe this Vigilius firmly by Gelasius doth but should not prove 23. So willing am I to quit Pope Leo and Gelasius from that hereticall doctrine wherewith Vigilius by his Apostolicall decree hath not onely himselfe eternally blemished the Romane See but laboureth also to fallen that heresie as an ancient and hereditarie doctrine from the time of Leo unto their See If this my indeavour for the honor of Leo and Gelasius be not accepted by them I must returne a conditionall and shorter but more unpleasing answer to this second reason of Vigilius relying on their authority and that is this If Leo and Gelasius truely and indeed taught the same with Vigilius that none after their death may noviter be condemned then were they also as Vigilius by the consenting judgement of the catholike Church hereticall If they did not indeed teach this doctrine then is Vigilius not only erroneous in faith both decreeing himselfe and judging them to have decreed heresie but slanderous also falsly imputing so great a crime as is heresie to so ancient famous Popes as were Gelasius and Leo And so whether they taught this doctrine or taught it not this second reason of Vigilius is of no worth at all proving nothing else but either them to be hereticall if Vigilius say true or himselfe to be a slanderer if he say untrue 24. Now after the reasons of Vigilius fully refuted in stead of a conclusion I will adde one short
in doctrinall as personall matters That Theodorus was dead is personall but that none after death may bee condemned for an heretike is doctrinall yea an heresie in the doctrine of faith That Theodorus dyed in the peace of the Church is an errour personall but that Theodorus therefore dyed in the peace of the Church because he was not in his life time condemned by the expresse sentēce of the Church or that any dying in heresie as Theodorus did doe die in the peace of the Church are errours doctrinall That Theodorus was not by the former Fathers and Councels condēned is a personall error but that Theodorus by the judgement of the Fathers Councels ought not after his death to be condemned is doctrinall even a condemning of the Councels of Ephesus and Chalcedon as guilty of beleeving and teaching an heresie So many wayes is the Popes sentence in this first Chapter erronious in faith of which Baronius most vainely pretendeth that it is no cause of faith no such cause as doth concerne the faith 41. There now remaineth nothing of Vigilius decree concerning this first Chapter but his conclusion of the same And although that must needs of it selfe fall downe when all the reasons on which it relyeth and by which onely it is supported are ruinated or overthrowne yet if you please let us take a short view of it also rather to explane than refute the same His conclusion hath two branches the former is that in regard of the foresaid reasons nostrâ b Vig. Const nu 179 eum non audemus damnare sententia wee dare not condemne Theodorus by our sentence wee dare not doe it saith Vigilius 42. Oh how faint-hearted pusillanimous and dastardly was the Pope in this cause Cyrill the c Sanctissimorum Episcoporum hic coactorum caput Cyrillum c. Epist Synod Ephes to 4. Act. Conc. Ephes ca. 8. head of the generall Councell Proclus a most d Cyrill epist ad Acat in Con. 5. Coll. 5. pa. 543. a. Dominus meus sanctissimus Episcopus Proclus holy Bishop whose Epistle as Liberatus e Lib. ca. 10. saith the Councell of Chalcedon approved Rambulas the piller of the Church the religious Emperours Theodosius and Valentinian the Church of Mopsvestia the Councels of Ephesus of Armenia of Chalcedon the whole Catholike Church ever since the Ephesine Synod both durst and did condemne Theodorus and besides these Baronius and Binius two of the most artificiall Gnathonizing Parasites of the Pope even they durst and did even in setting downe the very Constitution of Vigilius cal f Rursumque haereticus blasphemus c. Bar. an 553. nu 120. et seq et Bin. pa. 595. et seq Theodorus more than forty times an heretike a craftie impious madde prophane blasphemous execrable heretike onely Pope Vigilius hath not the heart nor courage hee onely with his sectators dare not call him nor cōdemne him for an heretike we dare not condemne him by our sentence 43. And yet when Vigilius saw good hee who durst not doe this durst doe a greater matter he durst doe that which not any of all the former nay which they all put together never durst doe Vigilius durst defend both an heresie and a condemned and anathematized heretike he durst commend forged and hereticall writings under the name of holy Fathers hee durst approve that Epistle wherein an heretike is called and honoured for a Saint he durst contrary to the Imperiall and godly Edict of Theodosius contrary to the judgements of the holy generall Councells defend Theodorus honor his memorie yea honor him as a teacher of truth while he lived as a Saint being dead These things none of all the former ever durst doe in these Vigilius is more bold and audacious then they are all 44. Whence thinke you proceeded this contrariety of passions in Vigilius that made him sometimes more bold then a Lyon and other times more timerous then an Hare Truely even from hence As Vigilius had no eyes to see ought but what favored Nestorianisme so hee had not the heart to doe ought which did not uphold Nestorianisme If a Catholike truth met him or the sweet influence thereof hapned to breath upon him Vigilius could not endure it the Popes heart fainted at the smell thereof but when the Nestorian heresie blew upon him when being full with Nestorius he might say agitante calescimus illo not Ajax not Poliphemus so bold nor full of courage as Pope Vigilius As the Scarobee or beetle g Pier. Hierog lib. 55. is said to feed on dung but to dye at the sent of a Rose So the filth of Nestorianisme was meat and drinke to the Pope it was vita vitalis unto him but the fragrant and most odoriferous sent of the catholike truth was poison it was even death to this Beetle So truly was it fulfilled in him which the Prophet saith h Jer. 9.3 they bend their tongues for lyes but they have no courage for the truth we dare not condemne Theodorus by our sentence 45. The other branch of the Popes conclusion is Sed i Vig. Const nu 179 nec ab alio quopiam condemnari concedimus neither doe wee permit that any other shall condemne Theodorus Nay we decree k Vig. Const nu 208 that none else shall speake write or teach otherwise then we doe herein As much in effect as if the Pope had definitively decreed wee permit or suffer no man whatsoever to teach or beleeve what Cyrill what Proclus what the whole generall Councells of Ephesus and Chalcedon that is what all Catholikes and the whole Catholike Church hath done taught and beleeved we permit nay we command and by this our Apostolicall Constitution decree that they shall be heretikes and defend both an heresie that no dead man may be condemned and condemned heretikes in defending Theodorus yea defending him for a Saint and teacher of truth This we permit command and decree that they shall doe but to doe otherwise to condemne Theodorus or a dead man that by no meanes doe we permit or suffer it to bee lawfull unto them 46. And as if all this were not sufficient the Pope addes one other clause more execrable then all the former for having recited those threescore hereticall assertions which as we have declared were all collected out of the true and indubitate writings of Theodorus he adjoynes l Vig Const nu 173. Anathematizamus omnem wee accurse and anathematize every man pertaining to orders who shall ascribe or impute any contumely to the Fathers and Doctors of the Church by those forenamed impieties and if no Father then not Theodorus for those may be condemned See now unto what height of impiety the Pope is ascended for it is as much as if hee had said We anathematize and accurse Saint Cyrill Saint Proclus Saint Rambulas Saint Acatius the Synode of Armenia the generall Councells of Ephesus of Chalcedon of Constantinople in the time of
Sâ—rab li. 14. Val. Max. tit de Cupidit gloriae lib. 8. ca. 14. did himselfe by burning the temple of Diana at Ephesus But when both the name and bookes of Nestorius was now so detested by reason of the imperiall Edict tunc caeperunt Theodori volumina circumferre saith Liberatus then m Liber ca. 10. they began but to disperse the writings of Theodorus which Baronius n Bar. an 435. nu 3. also confesseth when the rivers that is Nestorius was stopt by the Emperors law then the Nestorians ipsum fontem aperuore opened the very fountaine divulging the bookes of Theodorus and Diodorus The Epistle then mentioning the expresse condemning of Theodorus doth of a certaintie follow that imperiall Edict against Nestorius That Edict was published as by the date o Leg. ult de haereticis eod Theod. appeares in August when Theodosius was the fifteenth time p Is est annus Ch. 435 ut docet Marc in Chron. Bar. in illum annum Consull The union betwixt Iohn and Cyrill was made the next yeare after the Ephesine Councell for Iohn writing to Xistus Bishop of Rome and testifying his unitie q Placuit nobis quoque in sacrae synodi sententia acquiescere Epist Iohannis ad Xistum Act Conc. Eph. to 5. ca. 17. and consent to Cyrill saith in that Epistle that the Ephesine Councell was held anno proximè lapso the yeare next before The Councell at Ephesus both began and ended in the yeare when Antiochus r Act. Conc. Ephes to 2. ca. 1. ubi habita dicitur Synodus post Coss 13. Theodosij anno autem post istum Consulatum Antiochus Bassus erant Consules ut ex Marcell in Chron. fastis certum est Et to 3. Act. Eph. ca. 17. literae Im per. ad Synodum datae sunt Antiocho Consule Caepit autem Concilium 23. die Maij eo anno to 2. Act. ca 1. finitum est post quatuor ut Liber ca. 7. vel post 3. menses ut Socrates ait lib. 7. ca. 33. 37. and Bassus were Consuls Å¿ Is est an Ch. 431. Marc. in Ch. Bar. in cum annum Betwixt Valerius and Aetius who were next Consuls after Antiochus and Bassus and in whose Consulship the union was fully concluded and the fifteenth Consulship of Theodosius wherein the Edict against Nestorius was published are two intire Consulships t An. 433. Theodosius 14. et Maximus Coss an 434. Ariobinda Aspar Coss an 435. Theodosius 15. et Valent. 4. Coss Fasti et Mercell et Bar. as by the Fasti and others is certaine So that it is certaine that the Epistle which mentioneth the condemning by name of Theodorus was not written till more then two compleat yeares after the union ended but how long after these two yeares it was before Ibas writ it is wholy uncertaine in likelihood it was two or three more for some time after the Edict must bee allowed for the Nestorians to translate first and then disperse the bookes of Theodorus some more after that for the condemning of him by Rambulas some againe after that before Rambulas dyed to whom Ibas succeeded in the Bishopricke of Edessa and who writ this Epistle when hee was in possession of that See as both the title u Fragmentum Epistola Ibae Episâ—opi Edesseni Conc. Chalc. Act. 10. and contents x Ex quibus unus qui Theodorum condemnat extitit falso alicubi scribitur existit nostrae civitatis tyrannus Ibas in sua Epist loc citat tyranni autem nomine significari Rambulam testatur Liber ca. 10. ubi sic ait De quo Rabula successor ejus Jbas in epistola sua diâ—iâ— â—unâ— Theodorum praesumpsit qui omnia praesumit apertè in ecclesiastia anathematizare etc. of the Epistle declare By all which and if there were none else by the last onely that Ibas writ this being Bishop of Edessa it is cleere that some good while in likelihood three or foure yeares were past after the union before Ibas writ this Epistle of which Baronius tells us so precisely that it was writ eo momento at the very moment and instant when the peace was concluded 13. The other point to be observed is what manner of a Catholike Pope Vigilius and Cardinall Baronius have here set forth unto us Ibas when he writ this Epistle is with them a Catholike a Catholike Writer a Catholike Bishop in him you shall see the lively portrature of one of their Catholikes Hee even in this Epistle written after the Vnion when he was as they teach y Vig. Const nu 194. Ibam tunc temporis cum hanc Epistolam momento ipso unionis scripsit Catholicum fuisse Bar. an 448. nu 75. a Catholike denyeth God to be incarnate and Marie to be the Mother of God he condemnes the holy Ephesine Councell and the twelve Chapters of Cyrill hee commends Theodorus of Mopsvestia for a Preacher of the truth while he lived for a Saint being dead These are the doctrines of Ibas all of them taught positively and avouched not as the Cardinall fancieth historically related in his Epistle as the words z Vide Epistolam ipsam hoc clarum erit theÌ„selves do shew the whole fift Councell a Conc. 5. coll 6. pa. 575. 576. witnesseth all taught by him after the Vnion when he was one of the Popes and Cardinalls Catholikes yea taught consonantly to the Vnion which Ibas then embraced yet Ibas teaching writing and maintaining all these blasphemies and heresies that is oppugning with all his art and ability the whole Catholike faith is crowned and canonized by Vigilius and Baronius for a good Catholike Of such Catholikes their Romane Church hath great store nay seeing none is now of their Church who approves not all the Cathedrall decrees of their Popes and therefore this of Vigilius among the rest it hence ensueth that none is now a Romane Catholike that is a member of their present Romane Church who approves not Ibas such as he was when he writ this Epistle for a Catholike that is who approves not the most blasphemous heretikes and oppugners of the whole faith to be Catholikes and who condemnes not the Cyrillians that is all that maintaine the Catholike faith for heretikes 14. But still as yet the doubt concerning the Vnion remaineth Ibas say they when he writ this Epistle embraced the union with Cyrill and none can embrace that union but hee shewes himselfe thereby to bee a Catholike True none can truly and sincerely embrace that union which Cyrill made with Iohn the condition whereof was the subscribing to the holy Ephesine Synode and condemning of Nestorius with his doctrines but hee is and must be acknowledged to be a good Catholike Had Ibas approved that union or consented unto it Ibas had not beene Ibas he had never written that impious Epistle which in every part most of all in the end
almost in the same words The author say they o Con. 5. Coll. 6. pa. 575. of this Epistle teacheth two natures one vertue one person one sonne Sed certum est quod pro personis naturas ponit affectualem unitatem dicit but it is certaine that he taketh the name of natures for persons and understandeth an affectuall unitie even as doe Theodorus and Nestorius whom this writer doth defend and praise Thus both the Emperour and the whole generall approved Councell witnesse Ibas to meane by two natures two persons and by one person one by affectuall not by personall unitie and they witnesse this not as a thing doubtfull or uncertaine but they seale it with a Certum est this is certaine 26. The Epistle it selfe doth so abundantly declare this truth that none I thinke but a Nestorian can make any doubt thereof Maris to whom Ibas writ this was a Nestorian hereticke The end of his writing was to confirme both Maris and the rest of that sect in their heresie Had Ibas writ this touching two natures and one person in an orthodoxall sense he had utterly condemned that same doctrine which he purposely commendeth he had overthrowne Nestorianisme which he by this Epistle meant to establish Againe how could hee have condemned Cyrill or the Ephesine Councell as hereticall had he beleeved the two natures to be personally united in Christ for that is the selfe same which Cyrill and the Councell defendeth Or how could he have commended Theodorus for a teacher of the truth who denies the personall and holds onely an affectuall unitie of those two natures had Ibas meant that there had beene a true personall and Hypostaticall union of them Take the words in the Nestorian sense there is a perfect harmonie in the whole Epistle take them in the orthodoxall sense the beginning will then jarre from the middle and end this makes a discord in the whole writing yea it makes the profession of Ibas to fight with the maine scope and purpose of Ibas 27. That one place in the end of the Epistle concerning the union makes this most evident Ibas saith that among other things Paulus Emisenus required and Cyrill consented to anathematize those who professe quia una natura est divinitatis humanitatis that there is one nature of the deitie and humanitie in Christ Had Ibas by one nature meant one essence so that both the humanitie and deitie were one essence why should they require Cyrill to anathematize that for neither Cyrill nor any Catholike ever affirmed there was onely one nature that is one onely essence in Christ But by nature Ibas understood Person and so its true that Cyrill taught one nature that is one onely person in Christ whereas Nestorius Ibas and all the Nestorians affirmed two such Natures that is two persons to be in Christ according to which sense Ibas saith that Paulus dealing with Cyrill to yeeld to Nestorianisme and on the behalfe of the Nestorians required him to anathematize those who say there is but one Nature that is but one person in Christ and he slanderously adds that Cyrill consented so to do that is that he subscribed indeed to all Nestorianisme and renounced the Catholike faith the decree of the Ephesine Councell and his owne twelve Chapters In which slanderous report Ibas insulting saith Non enim quisquam audet dicere quia una est natura None dare now say that there is one nature of the divinitie and humanitie one nature that is one essence no Catholike then or ever did say but none dare now say that there is one Nature that is one person in Christ which all Catholikes both then and ever said and this the very next words doe declare but now they doe professe to beleeve in templum in eum qui in hoc habitat in the temple and in him who dwelleth in the temple which was the very comparison of Nestorius p Si quis dixerit Christum Deum verum esse non potius nobiscum deum hoc est inhabitasse naturam nostra per id quod unitus est nostrae anathema sit Nestorius in anathematismo 1. coÌ„tra Cyrill anath §. 1. in Act. Conc. Eph 2. to. ca. 5. in Appen pa. 768. to expresse that the two natures in Christ are two persons as are the house and inhabiters and one not by personall but onely by affectuall unitie and cohabitation So cleere it is that Ibas by his confessing of two natures meant two persons and by confessing one person meant one by affection but not by personall union that is meant all in an hereticall and Nestorian sense and nothing in the true Catholike and orthodoxall meaning 28. But what seeke I further proofe of this matter seeing the fift Councell approved by the whole catholike Church hath defined the whole q Tota Epistola haeretica est Epistola per omnia contraria est definitioni a Synodo Chalced. factae Conc. 5. Coll. 6. pa. 576. a. b. Epistle to bee hereticall accursing every one who defendeth it or any part of it An undeniable proofe not onely that the profession of Ibas made therein of two natures and one person is hereticall but that Vigilius and Baronius for this very point are anathematized by the whole Church because they defend that profession in this Epistle as Catholike and orthodoxall which by so many so evident demonstrations and even by the consenting judgement of the whole Church is condemned for hereticall And this I hope may suffice to explaine or illustrate the Popes meaning in the Position or conclusion which he undertakes to prove in his reason that Ibas was a Catholike in making this so orthodoxall and Catholike a profession in his Epistle of two natures and one person 29. Let us now come unto the reasons whereby our Author Vigilius proves this profession to be Catholike Those are specially three in which because they all depend on that which hath beene declared in the position we may be the more briefe The first is because Dioscorus r Dioscorus Ibam propter hanc specialiter fidei professionem qua duas naturas unam virtutem unam personam apertissimè confitâ—tur haereticum condeÌ„navit Const Vig. nu 195. and the Ephesine Latrocinie did judge both this profession of Ibas and Ibas himselfe for making this profession to bee hereticall propter hanc fidei professionem for this profession of two natures and one person he condemned and deposed Ibas Now the judgement of Dioscorus to have beene unjust and hereticall there is so doubt and therefore the confession of Ibas which hee condemned must be acknowledged as orthodoxall and Catholike as being repugnant to the hereticall doctrine of Dioscorus A very poore and silly collection for a Pope and I doubt not but Vigilius would have derided it had not Nestorianisme at this time bereft him of all sound reason and judgement Dioscorus and his Ephesine conspiracie maintained the heresie of Eutiches which denieth
that whē Ibas said that Cyrill expounded or explained his Chapters that explanation which hee meant was in truth a purging of those Chapters And what was there or is in any one of those twelve Chapters to be purged out They are all wholly d Quod nulla ex parte ab Euangelica Apostolica doctrina aberraverim id postquam Epistolas quas ad Nestorium conscripseram earum una habet illa 12. Capitula ea extat to 1. act Con. Ephes ca. 14. legissent communì omnium sententia confessi sunt omnes Cyril Ep. ad Imper. to 5. Act. Eph. ca. 2. pa. 829. a. orthodoxall approved in ever part both by the holy Ephesine Councell and after that by the Councell at Chalcedon e Conc. Chal. in defin fidei Act. 5. Seeing in them and every part of them there is not one dramme of any drosse seeing all of them are the pure and refined Catholike faith if ought at all bee purged out of them it must needs be a Catholike doctrine a position of the Catholike faith the purging and wiping away of any part purgeth out the whole Catholike faith every part of it being so connexed with golden linkes together that no man can deny one unlesse hee renounce al nor purge out any of that vitall blood but in stead thereof will succeed all the blasphemous humors of the Nestorians Since the explanation which Ibas meant was joyned with a purging of those Chapters it was not nor could it be any other but a plaine deniall condemning and anathematizing of those Chapters and of the whole Catholike faith 45. This will bee more cleare if we consider the occasion of this phrase and why the Nestorians called that an Explanation which as they meant was a condemnation of his Chapters S. Cyrill as he was most orthodoxall in this point for his sense so for his words he was not so strict and precise but sometimes tooke the word Nature in an ample and catachresticall signification for Person but commonly in the proper and usuall signification for Essence whensoever he tooke it in the later sense hee never then said that there was one onely nature in Christ which was the heresie of Apollinarius and Eutiches but hee still professed and maintained two natures that is two essences against Apollinarius to be truly in Christ But when he said that one Nature was in Christ he then ever meant one Person not one Essence And in this use of the word Nature hee followed Athanasius whose words he alledgeth and approveth we f Athanasii verba apud Cyrillū lib. de rect fide ad Imper. to 1. Act. Eph. Conc. ca. 5. §. Porro pa. 672. a. confesse Christ to be the Sonne of God according to the spirit and to be the Sonne of Man according to the flesh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not two natures to be one Sonne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but one nature of the Word incarnate Did Athanasius deny two essences either the divinitie or humanitie in Christ Nothing lesse in that very sentēce he professeth him to be truly God and truly Man but taking the word Nature for Person hee in that sense truly denies two and professeth but one Nature that is one naturall subsistence or Person to be in him In like sort Cyrill himselfe in his Epistle g Ea Epistola Cyril citatura ae Iustiniano in Edict §. Credimus to Successus affirmeth that there is una natura Dei verbi incarnati one Nature of the Sonne of God incarnate that is the Sonne of God being now incarnate is one Nature or naturall subsistence or one and not two persons and yet one consisting of two natures that is two essences the divine nature assuming flesh and the humane nature being personally united unto the Godhead which to bee his true meaning besides Iustinians h Ipse pater Cyril quoties unam naturam dixit verbi incarnatam Naturae nomine prosubsistētia usus est Iustin in Edict §. Credimus pa. 493. a. testimonie infinite places doe make evident those especially in his booke de i Extat to 1. Act. Conc. Ephes ca. 5. fide recta ad Theodosium where he saith k Ibid. §. Quin. pa. 666. a. the scripture sometimes ascribes all that is spoken of Christ to the man sometimes all unto God and speaketh right in both propter utriusque naturae in unam eandemque personam coitionem by reason that both the natures doe meete in one and the selfe same person Nor may we thinke this diverse use of the same word to be strange or unlawful but as the name of Father is given even in Scripture unto the Son l Tota Trinitas est Pater noster per creationem et guhernationem ut Esa 63. Et nunc Domine Pater nosteres licet persona Patris dicatur Pater Christi per naturam Aquin. in ca. 1. Epist 2. ad Cor. v. 1. Et Paternitas in divinis prius importat respectum personae ad personam quam respectum Dei ad creaturam Aquin. p. 1. q. 33. art 3. when it is taken essentially or put in opposition to the creatures but never when it is taken personally or put in opposition to the Sonne Even so when the name of Nature is taken as in Athanasius Cyrill and others sometimes it is without an opposition to Person it may there signifie the same with Person and note any naturall subsistence but when in any speech there is expressed or implied an opposition of Nature unto Person there it ought onely to signifie the substances or essences concurrant in in that person and not the Person it selfe Nor was it so great a fault in the Nestorians to take the word Nature for Person but partly in drawing that which was the unproper and abusive into the ordinarie and usuall signification they seldome by Nature noting ought but Person and specially for that they tooke Nature for Person even in those very speeches wherein was noted and expressed an opposition of Nature unto Person as in that profession which they made acknowledging in Christ two natures and one person where taking Nature for Person they were enforced to take one Person for one by affection or cohabitation neither of which truly making one person they called that one person which in truth was not one but divers distinct persons 46. This profession of one Nature that is of one naturall subsistence or of one person the Nestorions disliked in Cyrill and in his Chapters and thought it but very falsly to be the same which Apollinarius taught as appeareth by the Epistle of Ibas where he m Ibas in Epist apud Conc. Chal. Act. 10. thus writeth Cyrill confuting the Bookes of Nestorius hath written as Apollinaris did that God himselfe or the Word is made man so that there is no difference betwixt the Temple and him who dwelleth in the Temple for he hath written twelve Chapters to shew quia una est natura divinitatis
second Antichrist crescent In the third Antichrist regnant but in this fourth he is made Lord of the Catholike faith and Antichrist triumphant set up as God in the Church of God ruling nay tyrannizing not onely in the externall and temporall estates but even in the faith and Consciences of all men so that they may beleeve neither more nor lesse nor otherwise then he prescribeth nay that they may not beleeve the very Scriptures themselves and word of God or that there are any Scriptures at all or that there is a God but for this reason ipse dixit because he saith so and his saying being a TransceÌ„dent principle of faith they must beleeve for it selfe quia ipse dixit because he saith so In the first and second hee usurped the authority and place but of Bishops in the third but of Kings but in making himselfe the Rocke and Foundation of faith he intrudes himselfe into the most proper office and prerogative of Iesus Christ For t 1 Cor. 3.11 other foundation can no man lay then that which is laid Iesus Christ 25. Here was now quite a new face of the Romane Church yea it was now made a new Church of it selfe in the very essence thereof distinct from the other part of the Church and from that which it was before For although most of the Materialls as Adoration of Images Transubstantiation and the rest were the same yet the Formalitie and foundation of their faith and Church was quite altered Before they beleeved the Pope to doe rightly in decreeing Transubstantiation because they beleeued the Scriptures and word of God to teach and warrant that doctrine but now vice versa they beleeve the Scriptures and word of God to teach Transubstantiation because the Pope hath decreed and warranted the same Till then one might be a good Catholike and member of their Church such as were the Bishops in the generall Councels of Constance and Basill and those of the fift sixt seventh and succeding Councels and yet hold the Popes Cathedrall judgement in causes of faith to bee not onely fallible but hereticall and accursed as all those Councels did But since Supremacie and with it Infallibilitie of judgement is by their Laterane decree transferred to the Pope he who now gainsayeth the Popes sentence in a cause of faith is none of their Church as out of Gregory de Valentia he is an heretike as out of Stapleton Canus and Bellarmine was u Sup. hoc cap. nu 7 declared He may as well deny all the Articles of his Creed and every text in the whole Bible as deny this one point for in denying it he doth eo ipso by their doctrine implicitè and in effect deny them all seeing he rejects that formall reason for which and that foundation upon which they are all to be beleeved and without beleefe of which not one of them all can be now beleeved 26. These then of this third sort are truly to he counted members of their present Romane Church these who lay this new Laterane foundatioÌ„ for the ground of their faith whether explicitè as do the learned or implicitè as do the simpler sort in their Church who wilfully blind-folding themselves and gladly persisting in their affectate and supine ignorance either will not use the meanes to see or seeing will not embrace the truth but content themselves with the Colliars x Hos de author sac Script lib. 3. § Quaerit Catechisme and wrap up their owne in the Churches faith saying I beleeve as the Church beleeveth and the Church beleeveth what the Pope teacheth All these and onely these are members of their present Church unto whom of all names as that of Catholikes is most unsutable and most unjustly arrogated by themselves so the name of Papists or which is equivalent Antichristians doth most fitly truly and in propriety of speech belong unto them For seeing forma dat nomen esse whence rather should they have their essentiall appellation then from him who giveth life formality and essence to their faith on whom as on the Rocke and corner-stone their whole faith dependeth The saying of Cassander to this purpose is worthy remembring There are some saith hee y Lib. de offic viri â—ij § Sunt alij who will not permit the present state of the Church though it be corrupted to be changed or reformed and who Pontificem Romanum quem Papam dicimus tantùm non deum faciunt make the Bishop of Rome whom we call the Pope almost a god preferring his authority not onely above the whole Church but above the Sacred Scripture holding his judgement equall to the divine Oracles and an infallible rule of faith Hos non video cur minus Pseudo-catholicos Papistas appellare possis I see no reason but that these men should be called Pseudo-catholikes or Papists Thus Cassander upon whose judicious observatioÌ„ it followeth that seeing their whole Church and all the members thereof preferre the Popes authority above the whole Church above all generall Councels and quoad nos which is Cassanders meaning above z Ecce potestas Ecclesiae supra Script Enchyr. tit de Eccles the Scriptures also defending them not to be a Enchyr. Ibid. authenticall but by the authority of the Church that there is multo b Th. Boz lib. de signis Eccl. 16. ca. 10. § Illud major authoritas much more authoritie in the Church than in them that it is no c Non adeo absurde dictum est c. Gretz Appen 2. ad lib. 1. de verb. dei pa. 396. absurd nay p Potuit illud pio sensu dici Hos lib. 3. de author Script § Fingamus it may be a pious d saying That the Scriptures without the authoritie of the Church are no more worth than Aesops Fables seeing they all with one consent make the Pope the last supreme and infallible Iudge in all causes of faith there can bee no name devised more proper and fit for them than that of Papists or which is all one Antichristians both which expresse their essentiall dependence on the Pope or Antichrist as on the foundation of their faith which name most essentially also differenceth them from all others which are not of their present Church especially from true Catholikes or the Reformed Churches seeing as we make Christ and his word so they on the contrary make the Pope that is to say Antichrist and his word the ground and foundation of faith In regard wherof as the faith religion of the one is from Christ truly called Christian and they truly Christians so the faith and religion of the other is from the Pope or Antichrist truly and properly called Papisme or Antichristianisme and the professors of it Papists or Antichristians And whereas Bellarmine e Lib. de not Eccl. ca. 4. glorieth of this very name of Papists that it doth attestari veritati give testimony to that truth which they
professe truly we envy not so apt a name unto them Onely the Cardinal shews himself a very unskilful Herald in the blazony of this coat the descēt of this title unto them He fetcheth f Papista deducitur à Papa qualis fuit Petrus Christus ipse ibid. it forsooth frō Pope Clement Pope Peter and Pope Christ Phy it is of no such antiquity nor of so honourable a race Their owne Bristow will assure g Demand ◠him that this name was never heard of till the dayes of Leo the tenth Neither are they so called as the Cardinall fancieth because they hold communion in faith with the Pope which for sixe hundred yeares and more all Christians did and yet were not Papists nor ever so called but because they hold the Popes judgement to be supreme and infallible and so build their faith on him as on the foundation thereof which their owne Church never did till the time of Leo the tenth It is not then the Lion of the Tribe of Iudah but the Lion of that Laterane Synod who is the first God father of that name unto them when hee had once laid the Pope as the foundation of faith in stead of Christ they who then builded their faith upon this new foundation were fitly christened with this name of Papists to distinguish them and their present Romane Church from all others who held the old good and sure foundation 26. You see now the great diuersity which ariseth from the divers manner of holding the same doctrines The errours maintained by all those three sorts of which I have spoken are almost the same and materially they are Popish heresies and yet the first sort did onely erre therein but were not heretikes because not pertinacious The second doe not onely erre but by adding pertinacy to errour are truly heretikes but yet not Papists because they hold those Popish heresies in another manner and on another foundation then Papists doe The third and last sort which containeth all and onely those who are members of the present Romane Church doe both erre and are heretikes and which is the worst degree of heresie are Papists that is Antichristian heretikes not onely holding and that in the highest degree of pertinacy those heresies which are contrary to the faith but holding them upon that foundation which quite overthroweth the faith 27. By this now doth the evidence of that truth appeare which before h Sup. nu 19. I proposed that none who hold the Popes infallibility in causes of faith for their foundation that is none of the present Romane Church either doth or can beleeve any one doctrine of faith which they professe For seeing the beleefe of all other points relyes upō this so that they beleeve thē because they first beleeve this it followeth by that true rule of the Philosopher i Arist lib. 1. demon ca. 2. Propter quod unumquodque illud magis that they doe more firmely and certainly beleeve this which is the foundation than they doe or can beleeve any other doctrine I say not Transubstantiation or Purgatory but more thā that Article of their Creed that Christ is God or that there is a God or any the like which is builded upon this foundatiō And seeing we have cleerly demonstrated that foundation to bee not onely untrue but hereticall and therefore such as cannot be apprehended by faith it being no true object of faith it doth evidently hence ensue that they neither doe nor can beleeve any one doctrine position or point of faith Impossible it is that the roofe should bee more firme than the foundation which supports the roof or the conclusion more certaine unto us than those premisses which cause us to assent and make us certaine of the conclusion That one fundamentall uncertainty contrariety to the faith which is vertually in all the rest breeds the like uncertainty and contrariety to faith in them all and like a Radicall poyson spreads it selfe into the whole body of their religion infecting every arme branch and twigge of their doctrine and faith whatsoever errour or heresie they maintaine and those are not a few those they neither doe nor can beleeve because they are no objects of faith whatsoever truths they maintaine and no doubt they doe many those they thinke they doe and they might doe but indeed they doe not beleeve because they hold them for that reason and upon that foundation which is contrary to faith and which overthroweth the faith For to hold or professe that Christ is God or that there is a God eo nomine because the Devill or Antichrist or a fallible man testifieth it unto us is not truly to beleeve but to overthrow the faith 28. This may be further cleared by returning to our example of Vigilius If because the Pope judicially defineth a doctrine of faith they doe therefore beleeve it then must they beleeve Nestorianisme to be the truth and Christ not to bee God because Pope Vigilius by his judiciall and Apostolicall sentence hath decreed this in decreeing that the three Chapters are to be defēded If they beleeve not this then can they beleeve nothing at all eo nomine because the Pope hath defined it and then the foundation of their faith being abolished their whole faith together with it must needs be abolished also Againe if because the Pope defineth a doctrine they doe therefore beleeve it then seeing Pope Caelestine with the Ephesine and Pope Leo with the Chalcedon Councell decreed Nestorianisme to be heresie they by the strength of their fundamental positiō of the Popes infallibility must at one and the same time beleeve both Nestorianisme to be truth as Pope Vigilius defined and Nestorianisme to be heresie as Pope Caelestine and Leo defined and so they must either beleeve two contradictories to be both true yea to bee truths of the Catholike faith which to beleeve is impossible or else they must beleeve that it is impossible to beleeve either the one or the other eo nomine because the Pope hath defined it and so beleeve it to bee impossible to beleeve that which is the foundation of their whole faith Neither is this true onely in other points but even in this very foundation it selfe for the fift Councell which decreed the Cathedrall and Apostolicall sentence in the cause of the Three Chapters to be hereticall was approved by the decrees of Pope Gregory Agatho and the rest unto Leo the tenth If then they beleeve a doctrine to be true because the Pope hath defined it then must they beleeve the Popes Cathedral sentence in a cause of faith to bee not onely fallible but hereticall and so beleeve that upon this fallible and hereticall foundation they can build no doctrine of faith nor hold thereupon any thing with certainty of faith So if the Pope in defining such causes be fallible then for this cause can they have no faith nor beleeve ought with certainty of faith seeing all
relies upon a fallible foundation If the Pope in defining such causes be infallible then also can they have no faith seeing by the infallble decrees of Pope Gregory Agatho and the rest unto Leo the tenth the Popes Cathedrall sentence in a cause of faith may bee hereticall as this of Pope Vigilius by their judgement was So whether the Pope in such causes be fallible or infallible it infallibly followeth upon either that none who builds his faith upon that foundation that is none who are members of their present Romane Church can beleeve or hold with certainty of faith any doctrine whatsoever which he professeth to beleeve 29. Here I cannot chuse but to the unspeakeable comfort of all true beleevers observe a wonderfull difference betwixt us and them arising from that diversitie of the foundation which they and we hold their foundation being not onely uncertaine but hereticall and Antichristian poysoneth all which they build thereon it being vertually in them all makes them all like it selfe uncertaine hereticall and Antichristian and so those very doctrines which in themselves are most certaine and orthodoxall by the uncertainty of that ground upon which and for which they are beleeved are overthrowne with us and all Catholikes it fals out otherwise Though such happen to erre in some one or moe doctrines of faith say in Transubstantiation Purgatory or as Cyprian did in Rebaptization yet seeing they hold those errors because they thinke them to be taught in the Scriptures and Word of God on which alone their faith relyeth most firmely and undoubtedly beleeving whatsoever is taught therein among which things are the contrary doctrines to Transubstantiatiō Purgatory Rebaptization such I say even while they doe thus erre in their Explicite profession doe truly though implicitè by consequent and in radice or fundamento beleeve and that most firmely the quite contrary to those errours which they doe outwardly professe and think they doe but indeed doe not beleeve The vertue and strength of that fundamentall truth which they indeed and truly beleeve overcommeth all their errours which in very deed they doe not though they thinke they doe beleeve whereas in very truth they beleeve the quite contrary And this golden foundation in Christ which such men though erring in some points doe constantly hold shall more prevaile to their salvation than the Hay and Stubble of those errours which ignorantly but not pertinaciously they build thereon can prevaile to their destruction and therefore if such a man happen to die without explicite notice and repentance of those errours in particular as the saying of Saint Austen k Lib. 1. de baptism ca. 18. that what faults Saint Cyprian had contracted by humane imbecillity the same by his glorious Martyrdome was washed away perswades mee that Cyprian did and as of Irene Nepos Iustine Martyr and others who held the errour of the Chiliasts I thinke none makes doubt it is not to be doubted but the abundance of this mans faith and love unto Christ to whom in the foundation hee most firmely adhereth shall worke the like effect in him as did the blood of martyrdome in Saint Cypran For the baptisme of martyrdome washeth away sinne not because it is a washing in blood but because it testifieth the inward washing of his heart by faith and by the purging Spirit of God This inward washing in whomsoever it is found and found it is in all who truly beleeve though in some point of faith they erre it is as forcible and effectuall to save Valentinian l Ablutus ascendit quē sua fides lavit Amb. Orat. de obitu Valent. neither baptized with water nor with blood and Nepos m Qui jam ad quietem processit ait Dionys apud Euseb l. 1. ca. 23. baptized with water but not with blood as to save Cyprian baptized both with water and with blood Such a comfort and happinesse it is to hold the right and true foundation of faith 30. The quite contrary is to be seen in them Though they explicitè professe Christ to be God which is a most orthodoxall truth yet because they hold this as all other points upon that foundation of the Popes infallible judgement in causes of faith and in that foundation this is denyed Pope Vigilius by his Cathedrall Constitution defining Nestorianisme to be truth and so Christ not to be God it must needs be confessed that even while they doe explicitè professe Christ to bee God they doe implicitè in radice and in fundamento deny Christ to be God and because by the Philosophers rule they doe more firmely beleeve that foundation than they doe or can beleeve any doctrine depending thereon it must needs ensue hence that they doe and must by their doctrine more firmely beleeve the Negative that Christ is not God which in the foundation is decreed then they doe or can beleeve the Affirmative that Christ is God which upon that foundation is builded The truth which upon that foundation they doe explicitè professe cannot possibly be so strong to salvation as the errour of the foundation upon which they build it will be to destruction For the fundamentall errour is never amended by any truth superedified and laid thereon no more than the rotten foundation of an house is made sound by laying upon it rafters of gold or silver but all the truths that are superedified are ruinated by that fundamentall errour and uncertainty on which they all relye even as the beames and rafters of gold are ruinated by that rottennesse and unsoundnesse which resteth in the foundation Or if they say that both the assertions which are directly contradictory are from that foundation deduced Caelestine and Leo decreeing the one that Christ is God as Vigilius decreed the other that Christ is not God then doth it inevitably follow that they can truly beleeve neither the one nor the other seeing by beleeving that foundation they must equally beleeve them both which is impossible Such an unhappy and wretched thing it is to hold that erroneous hereticall and Antichristian foundation of faith 31. My conclusion of this point is this Seeing we have first declared that all who are members of the present Romane Church doe hold the Popes Cathedrall infallibility in causes of faith yea hold it as the very foundation on which all their other doctrines faith and religion doth relye and seeing wee have next demonstrated this to be a fundamentall heresie and not onely an hereticall but an Antichristian foundation condemned by Scriptures by generall Councels by ancient Fathers and by the consenting judgement of the whole Catholike Church that now hence followeth which I proposed n Sup. nu 6. to prove that none is or can bee a member of their present Church but the same is convicted and condemned for an heretike by Scriptures generall Councels Fathers and by the uniforme consent of the Catholike Church An heretike first in the very foundation of his faith which
which is in holding the true foundation of faith The contrary of all this falleth out unto them of the present Romane Church For not onely their sinnes are made more sinfull unto them there being no mantle to cover or hide them from the eyes of God and shield them from his vengeance but even their best and most holy actions which they doe or can performe though they should doe nothing but sing hymnes with David or feed Christs flock with Peter or give their goods to the poore and their bodies to be burned for Christ even these I say are so tainted with the venome of that Apostaticall foundation that being of themselves holy actions yet unto them they are turned into sinne and become pernicious and mortiferous For whatsoever act being in it selfe either good or indifferent any of their Church except onely the Pope himselfe who is a member transcendent doth performe because they doe it in obedience unto him whose supreme authority they make the foundation not onely of their faith but of all good actions in doing any such act there is a vertuall and implicit obedience to Antichrist an acknowledgement of his supreme power to teach and command what is to be done a receiving his marke either in their hand or forehead so that every such act is not onely impious but even Antichristian and containeth in it a vertuall and implicit renouncing of the whole faith In regard whereof none can ever sufficiently I say not commend but admire the zeale of Luther who though he was so earnest to have the Communion in both kinds contrarie to the doctrine and custome of the Romane Church yet withall he e Kemnit Exa Conc. Trid. 1. Tract de communi sub utraque specie pa 136. professed that if the Pope as Pope should command it to be received in both kinds he then would receive it not in both but in one kind onely Blessed Luther it was never thy meaning either to receive it onely in one or to deny it to be necessary for Gods Church and people to receive it in both kindes Thou knewest right well that Bibite ex hoc omnes was Christs owne ordinance with which none might dispense Thou for defence of this truth among many was set up as a signe of contradiction unto them and as a marke at which they directed all their darts of malicious and malignant reproaches Farre was it from thee to relent one hare-bredth in this truth But whereas they f Conc. Constant Sess 13. Conc. Trid. Sess 22. in decreto super petit de concessione calici◠Bell. lib. 4. de Euchar ca. 28. taught the use of the Cup to be indifferent and arbitrarie such as the Church that is the Pope might either allow or take away as he should thinke fit upon this supposall and no otherwise didst thou in thine ardent zeale to Christ and detestation of Antichrist say that were the use of both or one kinde onely a thing indeed indifferent as they taught it to be if the Pope as Pope should command the receiving in both kindes thou wouldst not then receive it so lest whilst thou might seeme to obey Christ commanding that but yet upon their supposall as a thing indifferent thou shouldest certainly performe obedience to Antichrist by his authoritie limiting and restraining that indifferency unto both kindes as now by his authority hee restraines it unto one The summe is this To doe any act whether in it selfe good or indifferent but commanded to be done by the Pope as Pope to pray to preach to receive the Sacraments yea but to lift your eyes or hold up your finger or say your Pater noster or your Ave Maria or weare a bead a modell a lace or any garment white or blacke or use any crossing either at Baptisme or any other time to do any one of these or any the like eo nomine because the Pope as Pope teacheth that they are to be done or commands the doing of them is in very deed a yeelding one selfe to be a vassall of Antichrist a receiving the marke of the beast and a vertuall or implicit deniall of the faith in Christ So extremly venemous is that poison which lyeth in the root of that fundamentall heresie which they have laid as the very rocke and Foundation of their faith 34. Hitherto we have examined the former position of Baronius which concerned Heresie His other concerning Schisme is this g Esse schismatici convicti sunt qui diversam à Romano Pontifice his decernendis sententiam sectati essent Bar. an 547. nu 30. That they who dissented from Pope Vigilius when hee decreed that the Three Chapters ought to be defended were Schismatikes A most strange assertion that the whole Catholike Church should bee schismaticall for they all dissented from Vigilius in this cause that Catholikes should all at once become Schismatikes yea and that also for the very defence of the Catholike faith I oppose to this another and true assertion That not onely Pope Vigilius when he defended the Three Chapters and forsooke communion with the condemners of them was a Schismatike himselfe and chiefe of the Schisme but that all who as yet defend Vigilius that is who maintaine the Popes Cathedrall infallibility in causes of faith and forsake communion with those that condemne it that those all are and that for this very cause Schismatikes and the Pope the ringleader in the Schisme 35. For the manifesting whereof certaine it is that after Pope Vigilius had so solemnly and judicially by his Apostolicall authority defined that the Three Chapters ought to be defended there was a great rent and Schisme in the Church either part separating it selfe from the other and forsaking communion with the other First the holy Councell and they who tooke part with it anathematized h Coll. 8. talis anathema sit saepe ibid. the defenders of those Chapters thereby as themselves expound it declaring their opposites to be separated i Nihil aliud significat anathema nisi à Deo separationem Coll. 5. pa. 551. b. from God and therefore from the society of the church of God On the other side Pope Vigilius they who were on his part were so averse from the others that they would rather endure disgrace yea banishment as Baronius k An. 553. nu 221. sheweth thē communicate with their opposites But I shal not need to stay in proving that there was a rent and schisme at this time betweene the defenders condemners of those chapters Baronius professeth it saying l Ibid. The whole Church was then schismate dilacerata torn asunder by a schisme Againe m An. eodem 553. nu 250. After the end of the Councell there arose a greater war then was before Catholikes so he falsly calls both parts being then divided among themselves some adhaering to the Councell others holding with Vigilius and his Constitution Againe Many n An. eodem nu 229. relying
Augustine Saint Ierome Saint Ambrose Saint Leo Papius Theophilact Tertullian Eusebius Prudentius and others most excellent Divines And I take God and the whole Court of heaven to witnesse before whom I must render an account of this protestation that the same faith and religion which I defend is taught and confirmed by those Hebrew and Greeke Scriptures those Historians Popes Decrees Scholies and Expositions Councells Schooles and Fathers and the profession of Protestants condemned by the same Thus he 11. Did ever mortall man read or heare of such a braggadochio For learning and languages Ierome is but a baby to him more industrious and adamantine then Origen then Adamantius himselfe A shop a storehouse of all knowledge his head a Library of all Fathers Councels Decrees of all writings an Heluo nay a very hell of books he devoures up all Rabsecha Thraso Pyrgopolinices Therapontigonus all ye Magnificoes Gloriosoes come sit at his feet and learne of him the exact forme of vaunting and reviling What silly men were Eutiches Nestorius and the old heretikes they boasted but of one or two Councells All Councells all Fathers all Decrees all bookes writings and records are witnesses of his faith They sayd it he swears it before God and the whole Court of Heaven that all Scriptures Councels Fathers all witnesses in heaven earth and hell yea the Devill and all are his and confirme their Romane faith and condemne the doctrine of Protestants Alas what shall we doe but even hide our selves in caves of the earth and clifts of the rocks from the force and fury of this Goliah who thus braves it out in the open field as who with the onely breath of his mouth can blow away whole legions quasi ventus folia aut pannicula tectoria 12. But let no mans heart faint because of this proud anonymall Philistim Thy servant O Lord though the meanest in the host of Israel will fight with him nor will I desire any other weapons but this one pible stone of the judiciall sentence of the fift generall Councell against Vigilius This being taken out of Davids bagge that is derived from Scriptures consonant to all former and confirmed by all succeeding Catholike Councells and Fathers directly and unavoydably hits him in the forehead it gives a mortall and uncurable wound unto him for it demonstrates not onely the foundation of their faith to be hereticall and for such to bee condemned and accursed by the judgement of the whole Catholike Church but all their doctrines whatsoever they teach because they all relye on this foundation of the Popes infallibility are not onely unsound and in the root hereticall but even Antichristian also such as utterly overthrow the whole Catholike faith This being one part of the Philistimes weapons wherein he trusted and vanted with his owne sword is his head the head and foundation of all their faith cut off so that of him and the whole body of their Church it may be truly said Iacet ingens littore truncus Avulsumque humeris caput sine nomine corpus 13. You see now how both ancient and moderne heretikes boast of Councells and therefore that the reason of Baronius is most inconsequent that Vigilius was no heretike because hee professeth to hold the Councell of Chalcedon Nay I say more though one professe to hold the whole Scripture yet if with pertinacy hee hold any one doctrine repugnant thereunto the profession of the Scriptures themselves cannot excuse such a man from being an heretike If it could then not any of the old heretikes would want this pretence or to omit them seeing both Protestants and Papists make profession to beleeve the Scriptures and whatsoever is taught therein would this profession exempt one from heresie neither they nor wee should be or be called heretikes But seeing in truth they are and wee in their Antichristian language are called heretikes as Cyrill and the orthodoxall beleevers in his time were by the Nestorians it is without question that this profession to hold the whole Scriptures much lesse to hold one or two Councells as Vigilius did cannot free one from being an heretike 14. You will perhaps say can one then beleeve the whole Scripture and be an heretike or beleeve the faith decreed at Nice Ephesus or Chalcedon and be an Arian Eutychean or Nestorian heretike No verily for as the Scripture containeth a contradiction to every heresie seeing as Saint Austen truly saith l Lib. 2. de doct Christ ca. 9. all doctrines concerning faith are set downe and that also perspicuously therein so doe every one of those three Councels containe a contradiction to every one of those three heresies and to all other which concerne the divinity or humanity of Christ But it is one thing to professe the scriptures or those three Councells and say that he beleeves them which many heretikes may doe and another thing to beleeve them indeed which none can doe and be an heretike for whosoever truly beleeveth the scriptures cannot possibly with pertinacy hold any doctrine repugnant to scriptures but such a man upon evident declaration that this is taught in them though before he held the contrary presently submits his wit and will to the truth which out of them is manifested unto him If this he do not he manifestly declareth that he holds his error with pertinacy and with an obstinate resolution not to yeeld to the truth of the scriptures and so hee is certainly an heretike notwithstanding his profession of the scriptures which he falsly said he beleeved and held when in very truth he held and that pertinaciously the quite contrary unto them The very like must be said of those three Councells and them who either truly beleeve or falsly say that they beleeve the faith explained in them or any one of them 15. Whence two things are evidently consequent the former that all heretikes are lyars in their profession not onely because they professe that doctrine which is untrue and hereticall but because in words they professe to beleeve and hold that doctrine which they doe not but hold and that for a point of their faith the quite contrary All of them will and doe professe that they beleeve the scriptures and the doctrines therein contained and yet every one of them lye herein for they beleeve one if not moe doctrines contrary to the scriptures The Nestorians professed to hold the Nicene faith and so they professed two natures and but one person to bee in Christ for that in the Nicene faith is certainly decreed but they lyed in making this profession for they beleeved not one person but pertinaciously held two persons to be in Christ The Eutycheans in professing the Ephesine Councell professed in effect two natures to abide in Christ after the union for this was certainly the faith of that holy Councell but they lyed in this profession for they held that after the union two natures did not abide in Christ but one onely The Church
this one cause touching the Three Chapters and this fift Councell besides many the like demonstratively to be proved untrue and false I speake it confidently and within compasse in six hundreth sayings at the least yet that they may not say wee decline the force of this so pregnant an exception we will for a little while admit and suppose it to bee true and try whether by this being yeelded unto them there can accrew any advantage to their cause or any help to excuse either Vigilius himselfe or his Constitution set forth in defence of the Three Chapters from being hereticall 13. Say you Vigilius by his last decree confirmed the fift Councell and approved the Catholike faith Be it so we deny not but that Vigilius or any other of their Popes may decree and have decreed a truth that 's not the doubt betwixt us and them The question is whether any of their Popes have at any time by his Cathedrall authoritie and teaching as Popes decreed an heresie or untruth That Pope Vigilius did so his Apostolicall Constitution in defence of the Three Chapters is an eternall witnes against them a monument aere perennius Had Baronius said that Vigilius never decreed the defending of those Chapters he had fully cleared him in this matter if he could have proved what he had said But seeing undeniable records testifie and the Cardinall himselfe with a Stentors voice proclameth this to be the true and undoubted Constitution of Pope Vigilius though hee had revoked and repealed it a thousand times yet can not this quit his former Apostolicall Decree from being hereticall nor excuse their pontificall chaire from being fallible It is nothing at all materiall which of the Popes Cathedrall Decrees the first last or middle bee hereticall If any one of them all bee wee desire no more the field is wonne 14. Say you Vigilius by an Apostolicall decree confirmed the fift Councell Then did hee certainely decree that all writings defending the Three Chapters doe defend heresie and that all persons who defend those Chapters for so long time as they defend them after the judgement of that Councell are convicted and condemned hereticks Then the former Constitution of Pope Vigilius set forth by his Apostolicall authoritie in the time of the Councell in defence of those Chapters is now by Popes Vigilius himselfe and by his Apostolicall authority and infallible Chaire declared to bee hereticall and Vigilius himselfe for that yeare after the Councell is now by Vigilius himselfe pronounced to bee an Hereticke yea a definer of heresie Vigilius now orthodoxal decreeth himselfe to have been before heretical Nay it further followeth that by confirming that Councell hee confirmeth and that by an Apostolicall and infallible Decree that all who defend the Popes Cathedrall sentence in causes of faith to bee infallible are convicted and accursed heretickes for by defending that position they do eo ipso defend that ConstitutioÌ„ of Vigilius made in defence of the Three Chapters to bee true infallible and orthodoxall which Vigilius himselfe by an infallible decree hath declared to bee erroneous and hereticall So far is this last and Baronian change from excusing Vigilius in this cause that upon the admission thereof it doth inevitably ensue both that Vigilius was an hereticke and a definer of heresie and that all who defend the Popes Cathedrall infallibitie in causes of faith that is al who are members of their present Romane Church to bee not onely heretickes and for such condemned and accursed but defenders also of a condemned and accursed heresie even by the infallible judgement and decree of Pope Vigilius 15. Their whole reason whereby Vigilius might bee excused being now fully dissolved There remaineth one point which Baronius and after him Binius observeth touching this often changing of Vigilius which being a point of speciall note I should wrong both Vigilius and Baronius if I should over-passe the same Some men when they heare of these often changings windings and turnings of Pope Vigilius in this cause of faith and of his banishment for defending a condemned heresie will perhaps imagine this to bee a token of some levitie unconstancie or folly in the Pope O fie It was not so saith o Cum saepe sententia mutavit haud arguendus est levitatis an 553. nu 235. Baronius What hee did was not onely lawfull p Cur ei noÌ„lleuit mutato rerum statu mutare seÌ„tentiam ibid. nu 231 jure meritoque mutavit sententiam Bin. § Cum igitur done by good right and reason but it was laudable also done with great q Vigilius magna consideratione adhibita atque prudentiâ diverso modo pugnabat an â—4â— nu â—0 advise wisedome and consideration Vigilius a man of r Summa constaÌ„tiae specimen edidit ibid. nu 49. greatest constancie One who stood Å¿ An. 551. nu 5. up with courage for defence of the Church adversus violentum ecclesiae grassatorem against Iustinian a violent oppressor thereof one t An. 553. nu 251. who fought for the sacred lawes enduring exile constanti animo with a constant minde for the same One who did by this meanes wisely u An. 547. nu 41. yea prudentissimè most wisely provide for the good of the Church One who in thus doing did wisely x PrudeÌ„s piuâ— pontifex hac in re prudenter est imitatus S. Paulum Bin. in Edict nu 11. to 2. pa. 499. §. Cum Bar. an 553. nu 235. imitate Saint Paul who condemned circumcision and yet when hee circumcised Timothie approved circumcision And though there bee a marvellous dissimilitude in their actions the one change being in a mutable at that time an indifferent ceremonie the other being in an immutable doctrine of faith Yet thus do they please themselves and applaud the Pope in these his wise and worthy changes 16. Now in stead of a better conclusion to this Chapter I will entreate the reader to observe with me two things touching their commending Vigilius in this manner The former is what an happie thing it is to be a Pope or have a Cardinall for his spokesman Let Luther Cranmer or a Protestant make farre lesse change theÌ„ did Vigilius what shall they not heare An Apostate unconstant inconsiderate a Chamelion a Polipus another Proteus even Vertumnus himselfe Let the Pope say and gainesay the same doctrine of faith and then ex Cathedra define both his sayings being contradictorie to bee not onely true but infallible truths of the Catholike faith O It is all done with rare wisdome with great reason and consideration The Pope in all this deales wisely and that in the superlative degree If when he is absent from the Emperor he oppugne the truth published by the Emperors edict It is wisely done Kings and Emperors may not make Lawes in causes of faith no not for the faith The Cobler must not goe beyond his latcher If when hee is brought before the Emperor he sing
Councell that Mennas dyed in the 21 yeare of Iustinian In that Councell n Conc. 6. Act. 3. a sermon or speech going under the name of Mennas to Vigilius was produced as a part of the Acts of the fift Councell the Legates of Pope Agatho cryed out before the Emperor and the whole Councell that it was a forgery which they proved o Eo argumento manifestissimè comprobarunt quod Mennas sex annis ante quintam Synodum sub Vigilio celebratam ex hac vitâ migrasset Bin. not in Conc. 6. in Act. 3. and that most manifestly because Mennas dyed in the 21 yeare of Iustinian but the fift Synod was congregated in the 26 yeare which ended on the first of Aprill though the first Session of the Synod was not held till the May next after which was in the 27 yeare of Iustinian Thus testified the Popes owne Legates and the Emperour with the whole Synod upon their evidence rejected their writing for a forgerie 19. Said I not truly unto you that the Baronian narration was a peece of rare Poetry might not a meane Poet make an excellent Tragedy of it were it not a fine Pageant to see the Pope and so many Bishops sit in Vtopia and there make a law for Taciturnity the Emperour the Senate and people consenting unto it would it not bee another and farre more delightfull Act to see the Pope and Emperour quarrelling about this law the one beating buffeting and persecuting the other fleeing both by Sea and land from Placidiana to Saint Peter from him to Euphemia from Constantinople to Chalcedon what a sport were it to see the Romane Apollo ascend into his Delphian throne and thence as from Olympus cast his fierie darts his thunders and lightnings against that Typhoëan generation which durst speake when he enjoyned silence Now the embassage which the Emperour sent to Chalcedon to intreat his Holinesse to returne the magnanimity of the Pope in refusing to come from the Altar the Emperours yeelding to all that he prescribed this of it selfe would incourage a Poet and cause him to presume of an applause But the most rare Pageant of all would bee to see and heare Mennas foure yeares after he was dead and rotten to speake and dispute against the Decree of Silence the Silentes umbrae to declame against Silence to see him a Bishop a Patriarch at the voyce of the Popes sentence Audisne haec Amphiarai sub terram abditae to come ab inferis to come with a Bill of supplication in his hand with a song of Miserere in his mouth to the Romane Iove and intreat pardon for his talking so much in the grave and among the infernall ghosts against the Popes Decree of Silence after all this to see the Pope shake hands with him and all his Metropolitanes and Micropolitanes p Tu cum omnibus Metropolitanis et Micropolitanis Episcopis Vigil sententia apud Bar. an 551. nu 12. note the eloquence of the Pope and so after a most joyfull reconcilement to see the holy Reliques caried in a golden Chariot an excellent dumbe shew about the City and that by a dead man Can you doe lesse than give the Poet Baronius a Plaudite for his so rare invention or contriving of this Fable 20. Why but is it credible that Cardinall Baronius the great Annalist of our age hee who bestowed thirty q Hoc opus ante annos circiter 30 aggressus sum Bar. in praefat dedic ante tom 1. Annalium yeares in the study of these Ecclesiasticall affaires that hee should so foully be overseene in a computation so easie and so obvious as to thinke Mennas to bee excommunicated to come with a supplication to the Pope and to ride in a triumphant Chariot with those holy reliques foure or five yeares after he was dead and rotten Overseene nothing lesse It was no ignorance no oversight in him he knew all this matter ad unguem hee knew that Mennas was dead long before that submission and triumph But the Cardinall was disposed either to recreate the reader with the contemplation of this his Poetical fiction or else for to shew you that with the charme of those forgeries and counterfeit writings with which he hath stuffed his Annals hee is able to metamorphoze all other men into very blocks and beetles that they shall applaud his most absurd dotages as undoubted and historicall truths which that every man may perceive it must be observed that though in this place where the cause betwixt Vigilius and the Emperor is debated the Cardinall is content that you should thinke Mennas to have been alive in the 26. r Hoc anno 26. Iustiniani finem vivendi fecit Mennas Bar. an 552. nu 21. year of Iustinian that is five years after he was dead for otherwise all his narration even the whole play had been spoiled there had neither beene any Decree of Silence nor any persecution by Iustinian nor any flight of Vigilius nor any excommunication of Mennas or Theodorus nor any submission of them and of the Emperour also to the Pope the Pope had not beene knowne to bee so farre above Bishops Patriarks and Emperours that they must all stoope to him and laying their necks at his feet say unto him Calcate me salem insipidum punish me as you please for speaking without your Holinesse leave and licence yea that Kings must pull downe abrogate and adnull their imperiall Edicts if the Pope doe but becke unto them though for these considerations hee is here willing that you beleeve that untruth concerning Mennas for all these depend on that one sentence of Anathema against Mennas yet when this matter is over-past when the Cardinall comes to a new argument where hee hopes this which is said about the cause of Vigilius wil be forgotten there he confesseth the truth indeed concerning Mennas and tels you a quite contrary tale For intreating of the Acts of the sixt Councel particularly of that reason of the Popes Legates against the forged Epistle in Mennas name he thus ſ Bar. an 680. nu 46. saith Ejusque rei certum illud attulerunt argumentum quod Mennas diem obijt anno 21 Iustiniani Imperatoris The Legates give a certaine proofe that the writing was forged because Mennas dyed in the 21 yeare of Iustinian the Emperour Loe the Cardinall knew and professeth it to bee not onely true but certaine that Mennas dyed in the 21 yeare of Iustinian and yet against his owne certain knowledge for maintaining this fictitious Decree of Silence and the fables thereon depending he perswades you to beleeve that Mennas dealt against this Decree was excommunicated by Vigilius and submitted himselfe to the Pope and rode with the relikes five yeares after he was dead 21. Truly this was scarse faire and honest dealing in the Cardinall by untruths to strive to bolster out forged Acts and writing But the Cardinals Annals are so full of such like stuffe
glory Both of them receive an infinity of glory but in that infinitie the weight is unequall and the one receives but as the pennie the other as the pound or talent of that glory Both of them blessed in the Kingdome of God but the former not blessed onely but crowned with blessednesse the later blessed but not crowned neither with the Aureall Crowne of Martyrs nor with the Lawrell garland of Confessors yet still whether coronati or non coronati as they both dye in the profession of the Catholike faith so are they both rewarded with eternall glory for profession of the Catholike faith As for heretikes such as die in heresie and out of the Catholike faith they are to be sorted with neither of these they have another and a quite different ranke Classis or Predicament of their owne They may not have that honour done unto them as to be called non coronati which implies that they have a part in felicity but not the Crowne As the Church doth justly anathematize and accurse such so are they to be ranked in the order of those to whom Christ shall say m Mat. 25.41 Goe yee cursed The Apostle n Gal. 5.19 20. reckoning heresies with Idolatry witchcraft adultery and the like of which he saith that they which doe them shall not inherite the Kingdome of God 35. Hence now it doth clearly appeare that Liberatus in saying that Vigilius dyed Non coronatus cannot intend as the Cardinall most ignorantly collecteth that Vigilius returned from the defence of the three Chapters to condemne the same for that being in Liberatus judgment a revolt from the truth hee thereby had by Liberatus beene accounted an heretike and to dye in heresie and so had beene in the ranke of those who are Damnati but Liberatus in saying he dyed non coronatus doth directly teach that he dyed in defence of those Three Chapters which with Liberatus is the Catholike faith from which hee had lapsed and revolted before but seeing at the time of the Councell hee returned againe to that opinion and therein dyed hee was saved in Liberatus judgement but not crowned By his penitence and returning to the defence of those Chapters he got glory but because he had so grievously lapsed before hee lost the crowne of glory And this also is the reason why Victor Bishop of Tunen mentioneth the death of Vigilius in such a naked o Vigilius Romanus in insula Sicilia moritur Vict. in Chron. an 16. post Cons Bas manner neither disgracing him as a Prevaricator as hee doth Firmus p Firmus donis Principis corruptus assensum praebuit sed in navi morte turpissima perijt Vict. ibid. an 11. post Cons Bas Primasius q Primasius à Catholicis pro praevaricatore condemnatus insâ—lici morte extinguitur Ib. and Pelagius r A praevaricatoribus ordinatur Ibid. an 17. post Cons Bas nor honouring him as a Martyr or Confessor as he doth Foelix Rusticus and Reparatus Å¿ Reparatus exilio apud Euchaidam gloriosa confessione transiit ad dominum Vict. an 22. post Cons Bas intimating thereby that Vigilius dyed in the confession and defence of the Three Chapters and therefore hee could not condemne him but yet because he was not constant in that profession he would not commend him 36. Yea but Liberatus by saying he was afflicted by that heresie t Bar. an 554. nu 5. plane alludit ad ejus exilium he doth plainly allude to the banishment of Vigilius Plainly Phy on such a Plain-lie out of a Cardinals mouth he doth not so much as obscurely not under a cloud or mist not any way allude unto it nor intimate or insinuate ought tending thereunto nor could hee indeed seeing as we have before declared that banishment of Vigilius is nothing else but a fiction partly of Anastasius partly of Baronius and Liberatus was no Prophet that hee could allude to their idle dreams But if he allude not to his banishment why then saith he that Vigilius was afflicted by that heresie as if there were no afflictions in the world but banishment what ere hee meant he meant not that And truly whatsoever calamities or afflictions either of body or minde befell Vigilius after he had once consented to the Emperors Edict to the condemning of the Three Chapters which in Liberatus account was heresie and because it was as hee thought contrary to the Councell of Chalcedon even the heresie of the Eutycheans all those did Liberatus impute to that his revolt from the faith and to that Eutychean heresie which he then embraced as Liberatus judged Now there are two or three evident matters which were great afflictions to Vigilius and may well bee intended by Liberatus 37. The first was the generall dislike which the Italian Africane and other Westerne Bishops took against him as soone as they knew that he had consented to the Emperours Edict they writ against him as one who denyed the faith and condemned the Councell of Chalcedon they censured judged and accursed him by their Synodall sentence they contemned him as a temporizer as one who to please the Emperour betrayed the faith This was no doubt no small affliction to Vigilius to bee disgraced contemned and accursed by his owne friends to whom by so many bands of duty and love he was so nearly conjoyned and this lay upon his stomacke for five or sixe yeares together even from his first comming almost to Constantinople to the time of the Councell 38. His second affliction followed upon his change in the time of the Councell for though hee then by defending the Three Chapters and publishing his Apostolicall Constitution for defence of them hoped to recover the love and good opinion of the Westerne Churches yet hee exceedingly failed of that hope Now hee was in farre worse case than before On one side he incurred the Emperours just indignation and made himselfe obnoxious to deprivation banishment death or whatsoever punishments may bee inflicted on pertinacious and hereticall oppugners of the faith which although the Emperour in his lenity did not nor would inflict upon him yet what a griefe is it to have all those punishments hanging like Damocles sword over his head and sure to fall upon him if the Emperour at any time listed to breake or cut the haire What comfort could he have who held not onely his dignitie but his liberty yea his very life at the will and pleasure of another On another side he had incurred the heavie and just censure of the holy generall Councell and of all Catholikes being by them adjudged and accursed for an heretike On a third side the Westerne Churches and the defenders of the Three Chapters were so farre from honouring him as he expected that they also for all that held him for no other than an unconstant and wavering person one that turned his faith with every winde and weather So whereas at the first hee was beloved and honoured of the
the Cardinall or his friends reply hereunto Will he or can he say that these men who thus judged were heretikes They were not The doctrine which they maintained was wholly Catholike consonant as they k Coll. 8. professe and as in truth it was to Scriptures to Fathers to the foure former generall Councells The doctrine which they oppugned and Vigilius then defended was hereticall condemned by all the former Scriptures Fathers and Councels Heretikes then doubtless they could not be that like a leprosie did cleave to Vigilius Will he or can he say that they were Schismatikes Neither is that true For they all even then remained in the communion with the Catholike Church yea they were by representation the true Catholike Church I say further they held communion even with Pope Vigilius himselfe till his owne pertinacy and wilfull obstinacie against the true faith severed him both from them from the truth In token of which communion with Vigilius they earnestly l Sup. cap. 2. nu 1. seq entreated his presence in the Synod they offered him the presidency therein yea they said in expresse words unto him before they knew his mind to defend the Three Chapters Nos m Coll. 2. p. 523. vero communicamus uniti vobiscum sumus We all doe hold communion with you and are united unto you Schismaticall then they could not be So the judgement of these men being all Catholikes and holding the Catholike communion doth evidently prove the whole Catholike Church at that time to have beleeved a Councell to be both generall and lawfull though the Pope dissented from it and by his Apostolicall authority condemned the same and the decree thereof 8. After the end of the Councell did the Church then think otherwise Did it then judge the Councell to want authority while it wanted the Popes approbation or to receive authority by his approbation Who were they I pray you that thought thus Certainly not Catholikes and the condemners of these Chapters For they approved the Councel and Decree thereof during the time of the Councell and while the Pope so far disliked it that for his refusall to consent unto it he endured banishment Neither did the Heretikes who defended those Chapters judge thus For they as Baronius witnesseth n An. 553. nu 221. persisted in the defence of them and in a rent from the others even after Vigilius had consented to the Synod yea among them Vigilius o An. 555. nu 2. redditus est execrabilis was even detested and accursed by them for approving the Synod Or because Vigilius approved it not Pelagius who is knowne to have approved it was so generally disliked for that cause of the Westerne Bishops that there p Adeo exhorruisse visi sunt Antistites occidentales aliam post quaâ—tam admittere oecumenicam Synodum ut non potuerit Pelagius reperire Episcopos Romae à quibus consecraretur Bar. an 556. nu 1. could not be found three who would lay hands on him at his consecration but in stead of a Bishop they were enforced against that Canon q Can. 1. Con. Nic. can 4. of the Apostles which they often oppose to us to take a Presbyter of Ostia at his ordination So much did they dislike both the fift Councell and all though it were the Pope who did approve it Now the whole Church being at that time divided into these two parts the defenders and condemners of those Chapters seeing neither the one nor the other judged the Synod to be generall or lawfull because the Pope approved it who possibly could there be at that time of the Cardinals fancie that the fift Councell wanted all authority till the Pope approved it and gained authority of a generall and lawfull Councell by his approving of it Catholikes and condemners of those Chapters embraced the Councell though the Pope rejected it Heretikes and defenders of those Chapters rejected the Councell though the Pope approved it Neither of them both and so none at all in the whole Church judged either the Popes approbation to give or his reprobation to take away authority from a generall Councell Thus by the Antecedentia Concomitantia and Consequentia of the Councell it is manifest by the judgement of the whole Church in that age that this fift Councell was of authority without the Popes approbation and was not held of authority by reason of his approbation 9. What the judgement of the Church was as well in the ages preceding as succeeding to this Councell is evident by that which we have already declared For we have at large shewed r Sup. ca. 4. nu 25 26. seq that the doctrine faith and judgement of this fift Councell is consonant to all former and confirmed by all following generall Councells till that at Lateran under Leo the tenth Whereupon it ensueth that this doctrine which wee maintaine and the Cardinall impugneth that neither the Popes approbation doth give nor his reprobation take away authority from a Councell was embraced and beleeved as a Catholike truth by the whole Catholike Church of all ages till that Lateran Synod that is for more than 1500. yeares together 10. And if there were not so ample testimonies in this point yet even reason would enforce to acknowledge this truth For if this fift Councell be of force and Synodall authority eo nomine because the Pope to wit Pelagius approved it then by the same reason is it of no force or Synodall authority eo nomine because the Pope to wit Vigilius rejected it If the Popes definitive and Apostolicall reprobation cannot take away authority from it neither can his approbation though Apostolicall give authority unto it Or if they say that both are true as indeed they are both alike true then seeing this fift Councell is both approved by Pope Pelagius and rejected by Pope Vigilius it must now be held both to be wholly approved and wholly rejected both to be lawfull and unlawfull both to be a generall Councell and no generall Councell And the very same doome must bee given of all the thirteene Councells which follow it They all because they are approved by some one Pope are approved and lawfull Councels and because they approve this fift which is rejected by the Pope they are all rejected and unlawfull Councells Such an havocke of generall Councels doth this their assertion bring with it and into such inextricable labyrinths are they driven by teaching the authority of Councels to depend on the Popes will and pleasure 11. Now though this bee more than abundant to refute all that they can alledge against this fift Councell yet for the more clearing of the truth and expressing my love to this holy Councell to which next after that at Chalcedon I beare speciall affection I will more strictly examine those two reasons which Baronius Binius have used of purpose to disgrace this holy Synod The former is taken from the assembling the
2. et 552. nu 8. was buffeted and beaten at Constantinople before the time of the Councell and forced to slee to Chalcedon partly when he was banished i Bar. an 553. nu 221. et 222. c. after the end of the Councell for not consenting with the Synod in condemning the Three Chapters Alas how hath heresie and malice quite blinded the Cardinall and bereft him of his understanding Iustinian neither before the Councell nor after it persecuted Vigilius Vigilius was neither beaten nor buffeted nor fled hee either to Saint Peter or to Saint Euphemia nor was he banished at all these all are nothing but the Poeticall and Chimericall fictions of the Cardinall no truth no realty at all in them as we have before k Sup. ca. 16. et 17. fully demonstrated Iudge now I pray you whether any but some Ajax furiosus or who were deprived of his wits would call the Emperour madde franticke sacrilegious possessed and guided by the Devill for persecuting and banishing him who neither was persecuted nor banished but enjoyed the latitude of liberty and all the benefits thereof even the Emperours favour and the comforts accompanying it But admit Vigilius had been banished as indeed many other Bishops were for defending the Three Chapters against the Decree of the holy generall Councell was Iustinian a persecutor a monstrous sacrilegious persecutor for banishing or punishing condemned heretikes and Nestorians such as all the defenders of the Three Chapters to have beene wee have * Ca. 4.5 et seq before declared what a monstrous persecutor then was holy Constantine for banishing Theognis l Socrat. lib. 1. c. 10. Bishop of Nice and Eusebius Bishop of Nicomedia for refusing to consent to the Nicene Synod What a persecutor was Theodosius the the elder who commanded m L. 3. de fide Cath. Cod. Theod. all that held the Macedonian heresie to bee banished and shut out of their Churches without any hope to recover the same againe What a persecutor was Theodosius the younger who forbad all men n Leg. ult de haer Cod. Theod. to have or reade the bookes of Nestorius or to admit the Nestorians into any City Towne Village or house What an horrible and monstrous persecutor was Martian who made a law o Extat in Conc. Chal. Act. 3. pa 86. that if any should teach the Eutichean heresie ultimo supplicio coercebitur he shall bee put to death If Constantine Theodosius the elder and younger and Martian bee no persecutors notwithstanding this severity in exiling punishing and putting to death heretikes what a malicious slanderer is Baronius for cōdemning Iustinian as a persecutor for banishing imprisoning or punishing with like severity the defēders of the three Chapters who were every way as detestable as damnable as truly convicted condēned heretikes by the judgment of an holy general Councel as either the Arians Macedonians Eutycheans or old Nestorians Thus to persecute that is justly punish heretikes is laudable thus to be persecuted is ignominious Non est pecoatum malos persequi p Lib. cont Fulgent Donat. art 20. saith Saint Augustine To persecute and justly punish wicked men is no offence neither are they just who are so persecuted but he who is persecuted for righteousnesse sake Had Iustinian done this to Vigilius hee had beene no persecutor But Vigilius who oppugned the truth Baronius who with such a virulent tongue reviles and railes at the defenders of Gods truth they and none but they are persecutors in this cause They kill not the Prophets nor Apostles but they kill murther as cruelly as they can that truth of God which the Prophets and Apostles imbraced and for defence of which they were ready to bee killed This spirituall persecution as Saint Augustine teacheth q Lib. 1. cont liter Petil. ca. 27 exceeds the corporall They r Aug. lib. 2. cont lit Petil. ca. 14. murther the Prophets who contradict the doctrines of the Prophets Mitius ageretis It were lesse crueltie in you to thrust your swords into the bodies of the Prophets then with your tongues to murther the doctrine and words of the Prophets And a thousand like sayings hath the same Augustine by which it were easie to demonstrate Baronius himselfe and not Iustinian to bee the unjust impious sacrilegious and franticke persecutor if by that which hath beene said this were not abundantly apparent 8. Now followeth the other Pageant of this Baronian Tragedy in declaming against Iustinian That respects his last yeares and his death in which part as being the last and therefore likeliest to leave deepest impression in the hearts of the readers because Baronius hath couched together the most vile accusations of all the rest and the very venome of his poysonfull affections and splene against the Emperour I am most unwilling to forsake the religious Emperour in the last act of all but am exceeding desirous to testifie my love unto him both for other causes and for this especially that he next unto God was the preserver of the Catholike faith when in this cause of the Three Chapters the Nestorians and especially Pope Vigilius laboured with might and maine for ever to abolish and extinguish the same in regard of which act alone if there were none else hee deserved to bee eternized in the blessed memory and by the best indeavors of all that love the Catholike faith Baronius ſ An. 563. nu 1. intreating of the 37. yeare of Iustinian which was about two yeares before his death tels us how at that time Iustinian Vnhappy Iustinian ranne headlong into the heresie of the Aphthardokites or incorrupticolae who t Evagr. lib. 4. ca. 38. Leont lib. de sect Act. 10. et Prateoll de Haeres har 55. Dicebant carnem quam ex virgine Servator assumpsit ante passionem incorruptibilem fuisse denyed the body of CHRIST to bee subject to passions death or corruption These as Liberatus saith u Liberat. Brev. ca. 19. were also called Phantasticks because upon their doctrine it followed that CHRIST had not a true and truely humane but onely an imaginary and phantasticall body Into this phantasticall heresie saith Baronius did Iustinian fall and runne headlong in his last age and for proofe hereof hee alleageth x An. 563. nu 8. most ample witnesses Authores omnes tam Graci quam Latini All Authors both Greeke and Latine they all testifie that hee fell into this heresie and they detest that impiety in him Nor did he onely fall himselfe into it but hee sought to draw all others into the same errour Ita ebrius y Bar. ibid. nu 9. factus est ut mente motus Iustinian was so drunke that being out of his wits hee writ an Edict z Illud constat Jmperatorem haeresin comprobasse eandemque scripto Edicto firmasse An. 564. nu 3. to confirme that heresie and bring all the Church to beleeve the same When hee prevailed not
Iustinian against him The former was this Eutychius pretended a Propheticall skill whereby hee could foreshew who should succeed in the Empire and hee began to tamper and practice this Art about some three yeares before Iustinian dyed as that Eustathius delareth At that time f Tribus circiter annis ante Imperium Justini Eust apud Sur. hee privately called Iustinus unto him and told him that he should succeed in the Empire after the death of Iustinian for so g Significavit mihi Deus te post avunculum tuum fore Imperatorem Ibid. said he God hath revealed unto mee The like good fortune hee foretold to Tiberius that h Nunc in partê reipublicae gubernacula commisit Deus mox autem et sinem concedet Ibid. ere long he should have the Empire alone Againe two yeares before the death of Tiberius hee prophesied of Mauritius that i Verè inquit non est alius qui succedet quam Mauritius Ibid. hee and none but hee should have the Empire after Tiberius idque juramento asseruit and hee confirmed this by an oath Now this Art of Divination and Mathematicall predictions especially when they prognosticate of Kings their deaths successours was never allowable in any wise State nor acceptable to any prudent Emperour It betokened no good to Caesar that they foretold k Suet. in Iul Caes cap. 81. him of those dismall Ides of March. Domitian was foretold l Suet. in Domit. cap. 13. not onely of the yeare but of the day and the very houre when hee should dye and when he had carefully looked to himselfe on that day enquiring m Ibid. cap. 16. the houre his owne men of purpose told him the sixt in stead of the fift hee then thinking all danger to bee past was by the Conspiratours who kept a better watch of the time than he did securely murdered What mischiefe ensued upon that prediction to Valence that one whose name did begin with Theod. should succeed unto him Socrates n Lib. 4. cap. 1â— declareth Hee thereupon murdered most unjustly all whom he could finde to be called either Theodori or Theodoti or Theodosij or Theoduli or Theodosioli or beginning with those letters What hurt followed as wel in this kingdom upon that prophesie G. should succeed unto Edward the fourth as in the next when it was foretold the Earle of Athel that hee should bee crowned before hee dyed who thereupon never ceased to rebell against his Soveraigne till hee was crowned with an hot burning iron our owne Chronicles doe declare All kingdomes all Stories are full of like examples It was not without cause that in the Code p Tit. de Maleficis Mathematicis et his similibus both of Theodosius and Iustinian there are so many and so severe lawes aginst this kinde of Mathematicall diviners their Art q Leg. 2. eod tit Cod. Iust being called damnabilis omnibus interdicta a damnable Art forbidden to all the punishment denounced against them being r Non solum urbe Roma sed etiam omnibus civitatibus pelli decernimus l. ult Tit. de malef Cod. Theod. banishment yea death supplicio capitis Å¿ Leg. 5. tit de Malef. Cod. Iust et leg 4. Cod. Theod. ferietur hee shall bee put to death who practiseth the curiositie of divining Now Eutychius taking upoÌ„ him this Art of divining coÌ„trary to those severe and Imperiall Edicts ratified by Iustinian whether for this cause the Emperour who by the law might have deprived him of his life did not chuse rather to deprive him onely of his See and liberty I leave to the judgement of others 29. The other cause was a most impious heresie defended by Eutychius whom they so much honour which alone being duely considered overthroweth that whole fabulous Legend of Eustathius Eutychius when hee had long continued in the defence of the truth did afterwards fall both by words and writing to maintaine the Heresie of Origen and the Origenists denying Christs body after the resurrection to have beene palpable that is in effect to bee no true humane body and the very like hee taught of the bodies of all other men after the resurrection This the Surian Eustathius quite over-passeth in silence for it was not fit that such a Saint as Eutychius so abundaÌ„t in miracles prophesies and visions should be thought guilty of so foule and condemned an heresie But Pope Gregory doth so fully and certainly testifie t Greg. lib. 14. Moral ca. 29. Eutythius scripsit quod corpus nostrum in illa resurrectionis gloria erit impalpabile it that no doubt can remaine thereof hee tels us how himselfe disputed against Eutychius defending this heresie how hee urged those words of our Saviour palpate videte how Eutychius answered thereunto that Christs body was then indeed palpable to confirme the mindes of his Disciples but after they were once confirmed all that was before palpable in Christs bodie in subtilitatem est redactuÌ„ was turned into an aërial and unpalpable subtilty How he further strived to prove this by those words of the Apostle Flesh blood cannot inherit the kingdome of heaveÌ„ how then said hee may this be beleeved veraciter resurgere carnem that true bodies did or shall rise againe How he further insisted on those words That which thou sowest is not the same body which it shall be proving therby that which riseth againe either not to be a body or not a palpable that is no true humane body Gregory also tels us that Eutychius writ u Libellum de Resurrectione scripsit ostendês quod caro vel impalpabilis vel ipsa non erit a booke in defence of this heresie which both himselfe read and Tiberius the Emperour after diligent ponderation of the reasons of Gregory against it caused it publikely to bee burned as hereticall adding that Eutychius continued in this heresie almost till the very houre of his death Now although Gregory tels not when or at what time Eutychius fel into this heresie yet it may wel be supposed that as Iustinian honoured him so long as he persisted in the truth so when once hee gave himselfe to such dotages of the Origenists which as it seemes he did about the latter end of Iustinians Empire some three yeares before his death then the Emperour who till his end was constant in condemning the Three Chapters as Victor showeth the condemning of which is as before t Hoc cap. nu 1â— we declared the condemning of all the heresies of Origen and whatsoever contradicts the verity of Christs deity or humanity as it is most likely exiled him for this heretical opinion And this is much more probable seeing Iustinian had purposely set forth long before this a most religious and orthodoxall Edict or Decree particularly against Origen and the Origenists as Liberatus u Cap. 23. sheweth and as the Edict it selfe which is extant x Apud Nar. aâ—
not hold Let us consider the Exception it selfe Vigilius writ this Epistle that is confessed hee writ it when hee was the onely true and lawfull Pope that wee have proved hee defined heresie in it and that which is against the faith that Bellarmine implyeth hee condemned in it the Catholike faith that Bellarmine in plaine words expresseth Thus far the cause is cleare Now whether Pope Vigilius in it defined heresie and condemned the Catholike faith as he was Pope or no that is the point here to be debated 43. Some may thinke that Bellarmine by those two reasons drawne from secresie and an ambitious minde by which he laboured before to prove that Vigilius did not condemne the faith ex animo meant also that he condemned it not as Pope for it followeth in the next sentence siquidem Epistolam scripsit as giving a reason of his saying If any like to take Bellar. words in that sort then his reasons are before hand refuted for as Vigilius might ex animo write heretically both privately and out of ambition so also might hee tanquam Pontifex condemne the faith notwithstanding both his secrecy and ambitious mind secrecy and an ambitious mind are no more repugnant to the one than to the other they are compatible with them both the Pope may use his Apostolicall authority in teaching as wel privately as publikely as well with Iudas in ambition as with Iohn or Peter in sincerity of heart But the Cardinals Apologist who it may be consulted with the Cardinall about his intent herein doth ease us of those reasons for hee i Gretz loc cit tels us plainly that from Vigilius his desire of secrecie nil aliud colligit Bellarmine collects or proves nothing else but this that Vigilius did not write his letter from his heart or seriò that hee did it not in earnest It is but a sport with Gretzer or with the Pope to condemne the Catholike faith they doe it but they doe it not in earnest they doe it jocularitèr not seriò Have ye indeed such May-games sports at Rome as to condemne the faith and then say I was in jest and in sport Are not these men new Philistines Call in Sampson Condemne the Catholike faith to make us pastime But let us leave them to their sports till the fall of their Babylonish house make a catastrophe and dolefull end both of their actors spectators That which I now note is that Bellarmine doth not in those words Siquidem Epistolam scripsit c. from the privatenesse or secrecy prove any thing else but that Vigilius writ it not seriò in earnest and from his heart that hee writ it not tanquam Pontifex this those words prove not Bellarmine in those words collects not So we have now nothing but the bare saying of Bellarmine without any proofe without any reasons and I must needs confesse I hold it a most sufficient encounter for any man to Bellarmines ipse dixit to oppose ipse dico yet because I desire rather to satisfie such as seeke the truth then contend with those who seeke to smother and betray the truth I will a little further enlarge this point and see if it may be cleared by evidence of reason that Pope Vigilius did not onely condemne the Catholike faith at that time but that he did it even as hee was Pope and tanquam Pontifex condemne the Catholike faith 44. What it is for a Pope to teach an errour as Pope may be perceived by other Arts and Sciences in the practice or exercise whereof together with knowledge judgement and skill fidelity also is required were Baronius or some Romane Facundus to examine this point they would quickly sute the Pope to some Cobler Pedler or such like companion I love not to deale so rudely with his Holinesse yet if I should happen at any time to let slip a word that way you know how the Cardinall quitted the religious Emperour with Ne ultra crepidam If a Physitian or Lawyer or Iudge in any discourse should speake barbarously or incongruously they erre therein but as Grammarians not as Iudges Lawyers or Physitians But if a Iudge for any sinister respect should pronounce that sentence as just which is against the law or if a Lawyer should after his diligent sifting of the cause affirme that title to bee sound which were clearely voide in law or if a Physitian should prescribe to his patient Coloquintida for an wholesome diet each of them now erred offended in his owne profession in that proper duty which belongeth to them the Iudge as a Iudge the Counsellor as a Counsellor the Physitian as a Physitian because they failed either in skill or in fidelity in those faculties wherin they professe both to know themselves and to make knowne unto others what is right and good If in other matters they transgresse it is not quatenus tales if any of them bee prophane covetous or intemperate they offend now quatenus homines as they are mortall men in those duties of morality which are common to them with all men If they bee seditious rebellious and conspire in treasonable practice they offend quatenus Cives as they are parts of the Common-wealth in those duties which are common to them with all subjects but when they offend in Physick law or judgment those are their own peculiar Arts and Sciences they then offend neither quatenus homines nor quatenus Cives nor in any other respect but quatenus tales as they are such professors for now they transgresse against those proper duties which as they are Iudges Counsellors or Physitians are required of them The like of all Artificers of Grāmarians Logicians Poets Philosophers of Presbyters of Bishops of the Professors of Theology which is scientia scientiarum is to bee said If a Divine shall speake rudely incongruously ad populum Antiochenum he offends as a Grammarian not as a Divine unlesse perhaps it bee no fault when it doth so happen for edification that hee ought so to speake as Saint Austen k Aust lib. 4. de doct Christ ca. 16. et Tract 7. in Johan did use divers barbarismes and say ossum for os floriet for florebit dolus for dolor Malo me populus I had rather edifie with rudenesse of words than speake nothing but pure Ciceronian without edifying them without honouring God But if a Bishop or any Divine in stead of truth teach heresie either because hee knowes not the truth or knowing it oppugnes the truth hee is now in his owne element he offends no longer as a Rhetorician or Grammarian but quatenus talis as hee is a Bishop as hee is a Divine as hee is one who both should know and bring others to the knowledge of the truth And this beside that by reason it is evident is grounded on that saying of Austen l Aug. Epist 50. Aliter servit Rex qua homo aliter qua Rex for as a King serveth God
qua Rex in doing that which none but a King can doe so a King or a Bishop or any other offendeth God as a King or Bishop in doing against that duty which none but they are to doe 45. Now what is said of all Sciences Arts and mysteries that is in due proportion to be applyed to that greatest mysterie of mysteries and Craft above all Crafts to their Pope-craft or mysterie of Iniquity He is the sheepheard to feed all the Physitian to cure all the Counsellor to advise all the Iudge to decide al the Monarke to command all hee is all in all nay above all hard it is to define him or his duties hee is indefinite infinite transcendent above all limits above all definitions above all rule yea above all reason also But as the Nymphs not able to measure the vastnes of the Gyants whole body measured onely the compasse of his thumbe with a thred and by it knew and admired the bignesse of his Gygantean body so let us consider but the thumbe or little toe of his Holinesse fault and by it conjecture the immensity of this eldest sonne of Anak Pasce oves confirma fratres must bee to us as the Nymphes thred or line for these two are the Popes peculiars in which are contained all the rest and they reach as farre as heaven and hell they are the Popes duty quatenus hee is Pope If at any time or upon any occasion hee swarve from this line if by his doctrine he cast downe his brethren instead of confirming them or give them poyson in stead of good food he offends not now as Swines-snout m Sunt qui Sergium 2. prius dicant os porci vocatum et ob turpitudinem cognomenti Sergij nomen sumpsisse eamque consuetudinem ad posteros manasse c. Plat. in vita Serg. 2. nor as Peter n Dicimus quidem quod Innocentius hoc dixit non ut Papa sed ut Petrus de Tarantasia In Extrav Johan 22. Tit. 14. de verbor signif ca. 5. Greg. 13. antea Hugo dictus à Boncompagnorū familia oriundus Anto. Cicar in ejus vita of Tarantasia nor as Hugh Bone companion but quatenus Papa even as Pope in that very Pastorall and Papall duty which properly and peculiarly belongeth to him as Pope Lay now this line and thred to Pope Vigilius and his Epistle did he confirme Anthimus Theodosius and Severus in the faith when he told them that by Gods o Vigil in epist apud Liber loc cit helpe both before and then also he held the same faith with them and that was Eutycheanisme and that they were joyned to him in the charity which is in Christ or was this wholsome food which hee the great Pastor of their soules set before them Accursed be all that deny one and affirme two natures to have beene in Christ If this bee hereticall doctrine seeing Pope Vigilius fed them and confirmed them in this faith then certainely he taught heresie as Pope that is hee exercised his Papall office even that of feeding and confirming his brethren which is peculiar to the Pope as Pope to the teaching and approving of heresie at this time 46. If yet wee shall goe somewhat more precisely and exactly to worke according to line and measure those acts of feeding and confirming doe but in a very equivocall sense for their doctrine is full of Equivocation agree to other Bishops but still a maine difference or odds is to bee observed betwixt the Popes feeding and confirming as hee is Pope and all others when any other Bishop teacheth heresie because his teaching is subordinate and fallible one may nay he must doubt or feare to feed on such food he must still receive it with this caution or tacit appeale of his heart if his holinesse commend it for an wholesome diet of the soule But if the Pope teach any heresie if hee say that the Sunne is darke the left the write hand poyson an wholesome food Eutycheanisme or Nestorianisme the orthodoxall faith here because there is no higher judge to whom you may appeale you are bound upon salvation without any doubt or scruple at all to eate and devoure this meate you may not judge nay you may not dispute or aske any man whether it be true or no the Popes teaching is supreme and therefore infallible indubitable this is to teach to feed to confirme as Pope for none can thus teach or feed but onely the Pope as Pope So the same hereticall doctrine when it is taught by the Pope as he is a private man is a private instruction without any publike authority to teach when by him as a Presbiter it is an instruction with publike authority to teach but without judicatory power to censure the gainsayers when by him as a Bishop it is both with pulike authority and judicatory power to censure suspend or excommunicate the gainsayers but yet subordinate and fallible including a virtuall appeale to the highest tribunall of the Pope when by him as Pope it hath all the former conditions both publike authority to teach and judiciall power to censure and which is the Popes peculiar prerogative as Pope to doe those with infallibility of judgement and supremacy of authority such as none may refuse or doubt to beleeve and embrace 47. If any will here reply with the Sophister Thrasimachus his subtilty in Plato p that the Pope as Pope teacheth not amisse q Plat. lib. 1. de Repub. but as hee faileth in the Popes duty as hee wants skill or will to performe that office This must bee acknowledged as true indeed for in the strictest sense of all what the Pope is as Pope that must inseparably agree to every Pope and the manner of his teaching as Pope must inseparably agree to the teaching of every Pope even as Logicians q Per hanc conditionem quatenus ipsam notatur quod praedicatum inest subjecto secundum propriam subjecti naturam Iac. Zab. com in ca. 4. lib. demon text 36. say that what agreeth to a man a bird or a tree quatenus talia as they are such must agree to every man bird and tree But this quirke and subtilty will not helpe their cause nor excuse the Pope from erring as Pope for as in this sense no Pope as Pope doth erre because then every Pope should erre in all doctrines which hee teacheth so neither in the same sense doth any Pope as Pope teach the truth for then every doctrine of every Pope should bee true Againe as according to this sense no Pope as Pope so no Bishop as Bishop no Presbyteras Presbyter doth erre or teach heresie for did hee in his teaching erre as Bishop or Presbyter then every Presbyter and every Bishop and so even the Apostles themselves should erre in their teaching But as Vigilius or Liberius when they taught Arianisme Eutycheanisme or Nestorianisme did this not simply as Popes but as persons not knowing as in
duty they should what to teach or knowing it but willingly teaching the contrary to their knowledge which in duty they should not even so Nestorius Macedonius Arius and Eutyches every Bishop and Presbyter when they erred they erred not simply as Bishops or as Presbyters but as persons failing in their Episcopall or Presbyteriall duties either not knowing the truth as by their office they should or wilfully oppugning and contradicting the truth as by their office they should not So by his subtilty if any applaud themselves in it not only the Bishops of Rome but of Constantinople of Antioch of Alexandria yea all Bishops and Presbyters in the world shall be as free from errour as his holinesse himselfe yea all professors of any Art Science or faculty shall plead the like Papall exemption from errour every man shall bee a Pope in his owne faculty no Grammarian speaking incongruously as a Grammarian but as wanting the skil required in a Grammarian no Iudge giving a wrongfull sentence as a Iudge no Galenist ministring unwholsome physicke as a Physitian no Artificer working any thing amisse in his trade as an Artificer but as being defective in the duties either of that knowledge or of that fidelity which is required in a Iudge a Physitian and in every Artificer If they will exempt all Bishops and Presbyters all Iudges and Physitians from erring as they are such Officers or Artificers we also will in the same sort and sense allow the like immunity to the Pope If they notwithstanding this subtilty will admit another Bishop to erre as Bishop they must not thinke much if wee exempt not the Pope as Pope For to speake that which is the very truth of them all and exactly to measure every thing by his owne line a Iudge simply as Iudge doth pronounce a judiciall sentence as a skilfull and faithfull judge an upright judiciall sentence as an unskilful or unfaithfull Iudge an erronious or unjust sentence A Bishop or Presbyter simply as Bishop or Presbyter doth teach with publike authority in the Church as a skilfull and faithfull Bishop or Presbyter he teacheth the truth of God as an ignorant and unfaithful Bishop he teacheth errours and heresies in the Church the one without the other with judicall power to censure the gainsayers The like in all Arts Sciences and faculties is to be sayd even in the Pope himselfe A Pope simply as he is Pope and defined by them teacheth both with authority to teach with power to censure the gainsayers and with a supremacy of judgement binding all to embrace his doctrine without appeale without doubt as an infallible Oracle as a skilfull or faithfull Pope he teacheth the truth in that sort as an unskilfull or unfaithfull Pope he teacheth errour or heresie with the like authority power and supremacy binding others to receive and swallow up his heresies for Catholike truth and that with a most blind obedience without once doubting of the same 48. Apply this to Vigilius his hereticall Epistle In a vulgar sense Vig. erred as Pope because he erred in those very Pōtifical duties of feeding confirming which are proper to his office In a strickt sense though hee did not therein erre simply as Pope but quatenus talis taught onely with a supreme binding authority yet hee erred as an unfaithfull Pope binding others by that his Pontificall and supreme authority to receive Eutycheanisme as Catholike truth without once moving any doubt or making scruple of the same What may wee thinke will they oppose to this If they say Vigilius doth not expresse in this Epistle that hee writ it by his Apostolicall authority Hee doth not indeed Nor doth Pope Leo in that Epistle to Flavianus against the heresie of Eutyches which to have beene writ by his Apostolicall authority and as he was Pope none of them doe or will deny that Epistle being approved by the whole Councell r Conc. Chalc. Act. 2. et 3. of Chalcedon Pope Leo by his Papall authority condemneth Eutycheanisme Pope Vigilius by his Papall authority confirme Eutycheanisme both of them confirmed their doctrine by their Papall authority both writ as Popes the one as orthodoxall the other as a perfidious and hereticall Pope neither of both expresse that their Apostolicall authority by which they both writ The like in many other Epistles of Leo and of other Popes might easily bee observed Not the tenth part of their decretal Epistles such as they writ as Popes have this clause of doing it by their Apostolicall authority expressed in them It is sufficient that this is vertually in them all and vertually it is in this of Pope Vigilius Yea but hee taught this onely in a private letter to a few to Anthimus Severus and Theodosius not in a publike generall and encyclicall Epistle written for instruction of the whole Church What is the Pope fallible in teaching of a few in confirming three of his brethren why not in foure in eight in twenty and if in twenty why not in an hundred if so why not in a thousand if in one why not in two foure or ten thousand Caudaeque pilos ut equinae paulatim vellam where or at what number shall we stay as being the least which with infallibility he can teach Certainly confirma fratres in cathedra sede pasce oves respects two as well as two millions If in confirming or feeding three the Chaire may bee erroneous how can wee know to what number God hath tyed the infallibility of it But the sixt generall Councell may teach them a better lesson Pope Honorius writ an hereticall Epistle ſ Quae recitatur Conc. 6. Act. 12. pa. 64. but onely to Sergius Bishop of Constantinople Vigilius writ this to three all of patriarchall dignity as Sergius was Honorius writ it privately as Vigilius did which was the cause as it seemes that the Romane Church tooke so little notice thereof yet though it was private and but to one it is condemned by the sixt Councell for t Vocantur istae et aliae Epistolae dogmatica scripta In eodem Conc. Act. 12. p. 65. a. et retractantes dogmaticas Epistolas à Sergio et ab Honorio ad Sergium Act. 13. pa. 67. a. et Honorius impia dogmata confirmavit Jbid. a domaticall writing of Pope Honorius for a writing wherein hee confirmes others in heresie and Pope Leo u Anathematizamus quoque Honorium qui hanc Apostolicam Ecclesiam et immaculatam fidem prophana proditione subvertere conatus est Leo 2. Epist 1 the second judged it to bee such as was a blemish to the Apostolike See such as by which Honorius did labour to subvert the Catholike faith The like and more danger was in this to these three deposed patriarchs It confirmed them in heresie it confirmed the Empresse it confirmed all that tooke part with them it was the meanes whereby the faith was in hazard to have beene utterly subverted For plurality or paucity it is